Unforgiven
by Grinning Lizard
Summary: HP... different. Not an original idea but an original story, somewhere between canon, reality and my warped imagination. Warning: Graphic Language/Violence, Racist/Abusive characters, Non-Consensual Sexual Content... Welcome to the Jungle. ABANDONED
1. The True Beginning

_This is a fanfiction by the Grinning Lizard. It is an alternate universe, as is most fanfiction, and explores as I often do the consequences of a very small change in the fabric of time. In this case it takes place after Harry's emigration to the Dursley residence some time in his childhood. There have been many fics like it but none will have been the same._

_This is a Nature versus Nurture exploration of Harry Potter._

* * *

Harry Potter was not a normal little boy.

He'd come to accept this a while ago- from his family endlessly telling him so, to the feelings he held too deep inside him to recognise- and had come to terms with it. But not quite what it meant.

Every human being knows they are different. It is part of human genes to know that their own being is Unique. Every member of the human race knows inside that they are different to their peers, because this is a truth- everyone is individual in every sense of the word. But whereas Harry had known nothing _but_ being different, there would come a time in his life when he'd realise that he was not alone.

The journey to this realisation would not be an easy one, nor one any could have predicted him make, but make it he did. Whether he came off different, or worse, or perhaps by a slim chance _better_ because of it, who could tell? People change a lot, and the experiences they live through mould and form their eventual selves.

This is the story of Harry Potter. And Harry Potter was not a normal little boy.

The Dursleys- Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon and Cousin Dudley- were what Harry had learnt was Normal. Harry had, through the years, come to _hate_ things that were normal. Because normal things were everywhere; they could not be escaped, they could rarely be changed, and why would anyone want to change normality anyway? Changing something from Normal usually meant it ended up Odd, or Weird, and people _hated_ weird things. Weird was _bad_.

Harry was weird.

But his known family were not- they did normal things, like gossip, go to work, and go to school, respectively. They had normal days and regular routines- of course, Harry did too, but his routines and days were decidedly less normal than that of his relatives. That was because Harry was a freak.

Rarely would his normal family include him, the freak, on such a normal day- later in life he supposed he should have savoured these occasions. The little slices he got to sample of being Ordinary. But the Dursleys were ordinary, apart from their secret in the cupboard under the stairs, and Harry didn't much like the Dursleys.

On such a day- a rare, strange day when obligation forced the Dursley family to include Harry in their life- things usually went from normal to bad, or worse, or even _weird_ when Harry came along anyway. Why even include him, they all wondered, when such inevitability loitered?

It was a day that didn't promise to be much of anything normal- it was early September and the sun was out and glistening off the rain-soaked Surrey populace. Rare to be so sunny, so late in the year, but (as Vernon Dursley grumbled, staring grimly out of his open front door) British weather could almost be relied on to be unreliable. He was almost quoting the new, pretty weather-girl on channel two with her apologetic smile who he could never remember the name of.

But Mr. Dursley was going to work today, and so would not be subject to much more that was peculiar, so really had very little to complain about. He would go and sell drills, lots of them, and become very smug with himself and be in a pleasant mood until he got home to his distraught wife this evening.

The front door slammed again, raindrops falling from the glinting brass knocker, and elsewhere in the neighbourhood of Little Whinging others began to rise.

The slam also woke up Harry Potter, who slept in the sub-stair cupboard not twenty feet from the front door with the Henry Hoover and mops, whose companions through the night were primarily eight-legged and intrusive.

Harry had only ever seen the sun rise once in his entire life, but he was too old to remember being wrapped in blankets on the Dursley doormat.

Vernon opened the cupboard lock for Harry, who was about six or seven (Vernon neither knew or cared) to make the breakfast. Petunia would handle the hot things, but Harry would butter the bread and lay the table.

Dudley, when he rose two hours later, was in a sleepy, docile mood until he remembered the date. He looked at the calendar his mother had bought for him and saw what she'd written in biro for today.

_Dentist, Midday, Duddiekins!_

Harry had frowned slightly at the ensuing screams, but had known better than to say anything.

* * *

When Vernon Dursley had disappeared in his car to go to work and sell drills, and Harry was entertaining himself with vague thoughts of pile-ups and flaming, smoky crashes on the route from Little Whinging to Guildford, Dudley was still sulking. He was strapped into the front seat, next to his mother, who was in the driver's seat, who Harry sat directly behind.

Grunnings Drills, ltd, paid a fair amount towards their employees and their families for healthcare- a fact which the opportunistic Dursleys took full advantage of- so as Petunia pulled out of the garage of Number Four and reversed onto the road, she directed the bonnet of her hatchback towards Epsom in the North of Surrey. In Epsom waited the best private dentistry she knew of, so she, Duddiekins and Vernon (also her unfortunate Nephew) had been members since Vernon's promotion 3 years before.

Courtesy of Grunnings.

The journey was short and uneventful, just as she liked her journeys to be, and she helped her son out of the car when they'd reached their destination. Harry helped himself out, and stared in a bored manner at the building they'd reached.

It was drab in half-effort, the nice sign above the doorway paradoxical to the peeling paint of the wall, but few children ever really know the welcoming sight of a dentist's. It could have been a bright blue building with the sign 'Free Ice Cream inside!' and Harry still would hardly have felt excitement at the prospect- however unlikely- of a Dentist's giving away sweet foods. Dudley might have though, he mused.

He noticed the scaffolding at the side of the free-standing structure and the bored-looking workmen on it with a child's curiosity before his Aunt prodded him sharply between the shoulder blades to prompt him forward. He walked in stoically, his cousin whimpering behind him two steps, and climbed an unholy amount of stairs while leaving the complaining to Dudley.

He reached the top well before, and rang the bell, and a pleasant looking nurse called Alice or Ally welcomed him with a smile before she noticed who he'd entered with. She repressed a grimace and Harry openly grinned at her reaction as she let them into the waiting room, a wide room with huge floor-to-ceiling windows in the south side and nice leather sofas.

When Aunt Petunia saw the scaffolding on the outside of the building, however, she turned to the nurse with a practised, faux smile and asked "Erm, excuse me – I don't suppose there's anywhere a little more - " a large exterior banging interrupted her "- QUIET!?"

The nurse simply shrugged apologetically and left the room. Harry thought she might have winked at him first.

Petunia sat as far from the window as possible and Dudley followed her. Harry occupied himself with the magazines on the centre-table and half-heartedly watched the looping private practise advertisement on the television in the corner.

He was halfway through the 'Invisible Crowns' demonstration when a "Mr. Busch?" was summoned by the nurse and Harry and his family were left alone in the waiting room with a middle-aged woman who was reading a novel.

He could only catch the odd snippet of speech from the television between the banging and shouting of workers outside and Dudley's whining about wanting to change the channel, or get a drink, or go home, or whatever he would whine about.

Petunia half-heartedly placated him, absorbed in a gossip magazine she'd found on the sofa.

The fourth time through the advert for self-whitening and the banging stopped for a while. Harry was daydreaming, staring absently at the plain white ceiling, and Dudley was focused briefly on a handheld game Petunia had strategically brought for him.

Vaguely Harry looked from the ceiling to the window, then to the T.V, then back to the window again.

Oddly enough, through the window, Harry could see no workmen. Oddly enough, all Harry could see standing on the scaffold was a figure dressed very strangely indeed. Someone dressed so strangely they could have looked more out of place only by standing inside the waiting room itself.

What was so unnerving, so _chilling_, was that this strangely-garbed person standing outside on the scaffold was staring _right back into the building_.

More specifically, they were staring at Harry.

For a second, or more, Harry sat there, utterly confused. If he'd even had time to _become_ confused. This was so sudden, and so weird, he didn't really have time to react to it.

The person outside, facing the window, who was dressed in what looked like a cloak from a cheesy fantasy film or an old black bathrobe, stayed staring at Harry for not very long.

They lifted their arm, and Harry watched as they pointed a stick at the window between them. A very long, shiny stick that reflected the sun.

The figure mouthed something- something not actually directed at him, he realised- and all of a sudden the window that had separated them was no longer there. All of a sudden, they were climbing over the windowsill and into the room.

Harry didn't hear Petunia scream. Or the Nurse who had just walked into the waiting room again. He didn't hear Dudley burst into tears. Harry didn't hear anything. Harry wasn't even breathing.

Harry was staring into the blackest, coldest eyes he'd ever seen.

The figure said something- whatever it was, it didn't matter, because then the figure fell. It looked as though he'd been struck by some strange lightning from the side, except they were all still inside. He'd been silhouetted by the sunlight pouring unrestricted into the room from behind him.

He hit the floor as Harry became aware of his heartbeat, beating impossibly powerfully in his very throat. All he could hear was wind swirling about his ears.

What occurred then was a sickly blur to him. He knew something had happened- or nearly happened- to him, but he wasn't sure what. He wasn't really thinking at all. He simply sat there, turning his head to whatever was happening.

He saw the shapes of two more robed figures come through the window, flashes of light being exchanged between the middle-aged woman who had before been merely reading her book and these odd strangers. He saw one of the flashes go _into_ the nurse and then saw her fall. He saw the open, screaming mouths of his relatives. He saw the sticks they were holding and everyone's mouth screaming. He saw his hands come into contact with the sofa and push himself, impossibly slowly, up to a standing position. Slowly, slowly, creaking upright like a growing oak, with no conscious thought- merely the spectator in his own form, trapped behind the bars of conscious inaction- slowly, slowly, the woman falling, the first figure rising again, all three strangers turning to him, slowly, slowly, and there he was- standing.

Slowly, slowly, all three raised their arms and sticks to point at him. Slowly, their mouths opened in unison… slowly…

A sharp, sudden return to the present had Harry fall to his knees. His arms he found outstretched, his throat sore from his shout, staring at the blue carpet.

He heard the impacts somewhere in front of him, and also his cousin whimpering, and the tinkling of broken glass being disturbed, and another female scream from somewhere in front of him.

He raised his head.

The woman stranger- the one who he'd heard- hadn't met with solid planks of wood on the other side of the window. She'd met with a gaping gap like a screaming mouth in the flooring of the scaffold. She'd plummeted right through, matching the gap's wide mouth with her own. The gap was laughing- but she felt nothing but terror as she fell.

The man who'd come through after the first one had gone neck first into a propped up pile of bricks. He soon met his comrade on the bottom floor, but a tonne of bricks and dry mortar followed him down, and he wasn't alive enough to scream about it.

The first one through, who now stood up laboriously on the top floor of the scaffold where Harry had first seen him, some might have counted as lucky. But this figure had lost his stick, and had fear and confusion in his eye as he regarded his mark.

Harry didn't think. He didn't do anything but bring his hands together in a flat-palmed clap.

As the small clap rang out, the initial figure heard it, and felt a strange alteration in the cool climate of September. Suddenly, the cheerful, chilly sun became wrathful and wild, and grew hotter… and hotter… he began to sweat, then choke as the air left his lungs, then his eyes grew wide and he tried to grasp his throat. But he couldn't. It was too hot. Too stiflingly boiling and horrifically _hot_.

Before Harry's young eyes and together palms, the first figure burst into flames. His crisping knees met wooded planks, and until they sizzled in their sockets his eyes were linked with Harry's.

* * *

He lay staring into the darkness to where he knew the ceiling would be.

Up.

He lay, open eyed and dry mouthed, where he had for nearly two days now. He'd not eaten, drunk, or even left his cupboard. He hadn't done much of anything.

His relatives were completely content to leave him this way. They'd not looked in once, his Uncle out of tremendous rage and his other family members for sheer fear.

They were secretly hoping he might die. His own hope wasn't secret.

He stared into darkness… but all he saw were those eyes.

Black, but alive and drenched with fear. Terror. Pain.

What _he'd _done.

He couldn't remember ever feeling so much turmoil, and miserable confusion, in all his young life. Maybe, he reasoned, if he went crazy he could forget those eyes. Forget the screams of the falling. Forget the sound of plummeting terror, and slowly roasting death.

He didn't cry again- after the first twelve hours there hadn't seemed much point. He raised his hands for the thousandth times in front of his face, looked at where he knew they'd be. He didn't bring either hand anywhere near the other.

He slapped his own face. Then again. _Hard_.

He banged the floor by his mattress.

He thumped the door of the cupboard, and then quickly stopped breathing, quiet as a mouse, frightened of what the resounding bang might bring upon him. He could handle his Uncle's ignorance, but didn't want a beating.

_But why not?_ A mutinous thought escaped. _Why shouldn't I? What have I to fear, now?_

"…Nothing," he whispered in a cracked voice.

He thumped the door again.

"…Everything."

He hit it harder, it rocking on its hinges.

"Nothing"

He hit out with both hands, one on either side of the cupboard, hitting the door and shelves and knocking dust from the ceiling into his eyes.

"EVERYTHING!"

He used his elbows.

"NOTHING!"

He hit even harder, only on the door.

"EVERY – _THING!_"

Crack. The door flew open. Moonlight refracted in. His wide, scared eyes caught it and he hunched up to the other side of his cell.

He sat there, shaking slightly, for more than a minute, listening.

The house was empty.

He crawled out, weak, tears running down his face, and the clock on the wall told him it was 2:02 in the morning. The Dursleys were away for the night. He staggered into the kitchen, his arms raised slightly away from his hips. His eyes stayed wide open, bleary with tears.

He collapsed at the table.

"Everything," he conceded.

He brought his hands to his forehead, the balls of the palms rubbing his eyelids, his fingers raking his hair, and then he brought them absently together in front of his face, breathing into the steeples of his fingers.

He brought them away suddenly, swinging them wide away like he was being crucified, breathing heavily through his nose, his scruffy hair falling down over his head.

He waited, his teeth clenched.

When nothing happened, he exhaled loudly, in ecstasy, and brought his hands together one time, another time, clapping louder. He froze in fear, waiting for something to happen.

No flames.

No fire.

No death.

He clapped his hands again, slowly.

Nothing.

He smiled slightly. Nothing happened. He wasn't- _wait! What was that?_

He froze in his seat, breathing stifled.

_There again._

A click.

Somewhere in the darkness... Or was it-?

No, it was coming from outside. Someone was outside the French doors leading to the patio.

_Click_.

Trying to get in..?

Harry walked very calmly, surreally, back to his cupboard, and closed the door on himself. He sat there and listened.

_A burglar maybe,_ his mind raced. _Lets hope he doesn't fancy stealing a Henry Hoover._ Absurdly, Harry wrapped his arm around the novelty housekeeping item, pulling it close.

Then he heard the patio doors open. Then he heard the footsteps in the kitchen on the linoleum flooring. Then he heard their hushed voices.

Harry couldn't bear this. He couldn't bear any more strangers with sticks. For that is what they were… two very strange men with sticks. In his kitchen. Coming into the house. For him?

But as they moved past the cupboard he was in, talking in whispers, he thought they both sounded very…_ old._ How _strange_?

One of them moved upstairs- for all his stealth, the floorboards above Harry's head creaked as he ascended. The other went into the living room. For a long time, nothing else happened. He could almost believe he was still alone.

Suddenly, very heavy footsteps thumped down the stairs, and as they reached the bottom they said some strange words and then flicked the lights on.

_These can't be burglars._

"My dear sir," said an old voice from the living room, now at full volume. "Is it really necessary to signal to the entire street that we are here?"

"Psh," the other tutted from the hallway. "Nobody will know a thing, Nicholas, and there's no sense working in the dark."

"I suppose," said the first, who through the shades he cast on the slats in the cupboard vent Harry could locate.

"Now then- we ought to not dally. Where shall we start?"

"Albus, my boy, you tell me."

More sounds of movement.

"This umbrella might do nicely…"

"No," the other simply said. Harry was beginning to think he was dreaming. "The umbrella is likely to be taken out and around. It is not quite suitable. I need a foundation, or something-"

"Well, alright. Upstairs or down?"

"Both- oh, gracious Albus, are you sure you checked upstairs thoroughly?"

"Quite so."

"It wouldn't do to have them stumbling upon us in the midst of the-"

"Nicholas, I promise you, checking was a formality. The Dursleys and Harry are visiting a dinner function for the father's company employees in Guildford. They are staying the night at the Alejandro hotel. We are quite alright here."

Harry nearly panicked. They knew who he was, who his family were, and they thought he was out of the house. He gripped the vacuum tightly and swallowed.

The other one sighed, saying, "So be it. And on your head. Sneaking around in the middle of the blasted night, against the bloody law-" he broke off into mumbles, and then eventually said, "Point me somewhere and I'll make the runes."

"That's the spirit- we'll be done in a jiffy."

"If you say so, my boy."

Harry heard more movement, more strange words being whispered and sat dead still breathing steadily for about ten more minutes. He could feel their bustling presence in the otherwise still house.

Finally, one spoke again.

"Oh, Albus-"

"Mm?"

"I don't suppose you'll tell me _why_ we're sneaking about in the Dursley home in the middle of the night checking the ward structure, will you?"

A pause.

"You haven't heard of the attack on the muggle dentist, but it'll be common knowledge I have no doubt very soon."

"Alright. So why-?"

"Harry was at the surgery. With his Aunt and Cousin, we believe. The records tell us that much. The young muggle nurse on duty was killed by the curse, and we found Jemima dead at the scene."

"Jemima? That young cursebreaker- oh, how terrible! What happened?"

"Somehow, the Lestranges and – you'll never believe it – Bartemius Crouch Junior caught up with Harry."

"The politician's son? Oh dear-"

The other sighed, continuing, "So we have reason to believe that the remnant Death Eaters figured out where he lives. Jemima was on duty, so she fended off the attack before she was killed, and very well I must say, but she lost her life for it."

"That's dreadful. Oh, but Albus, why not just take him away to Hogwarts if he's been breached here!?"

"You know my reasons for it," the one called Albus said quietly.

The rest of the conversation was done in whispers. They didn't open the cupboard for the duration of their visit.

When they eventually left, it was as though they'd never been there, and Harry wasn't sure himself that they had.

For a long time he sat there, dead still, head swimming.

Dawn was peaking, though he didn't know it, when he curled up under his covers and drifted far away…


	2. The First Flight

_Hello again. I warned you about violence and language- it'll start coming out from now. By the way, I'm going to be updating every week or so- but seeing as its the first day of publishing and I've already done 6 chapters I'll stick a couple up. Hope you enjoy. Oh, and by the way, the fast pacedness of this story will slow down after a few more chapters- I kind of have to get through a fair few years in a short space of writing. Hopefully it'll come out ok.

* * *

His cousin had avoided him for nearly a whole week._

Today he was not so lucky.

It was a frosty Tuesday lunchtime, the winter catching up, and there he stood in all his bulk and glory. Flanking him on either side was three or four of his friends.

They'd come for sport. Their favourite sport, in fact- Harry Baiting. 'Watch him run,' they'd sing, 'Make him squeal, make him curl like orange peel, make him dance, pull his tie, kick him til he falls or cries…' They'd thought of dozens of verses of shaky rhyme, and they'd chant it like a mantra as they tortured him.

It had been this way for all two years he'd been at this school.

But today..?

Harry was tired. He didn't run _or_ squeal, not that he normally did the latter. He stayed sitting, and the first kick landed on his tensed arm. It knocked him off balance but he hardly felt any pain. He didn't even close his eyes, he looked blandly on.

_Life_, he'd decided, _wasn't living anymore. Reality_, he mused_, isn't real_.

Another kick, to the ribs.

_This_, he wondered, _is it really happening?_

Someone knelt on his head. Another was pummelling his legs.

_Even if it is…_ _who cares?_

Kicks. Punches. He closed his eyes.

_Me?_

Someone kicked him in the groin.

_God?_

Laughter rang in his ears. Rhyme.

_My mum and dad?_

His eyes opened and a scream rang out… but it wasn't his own. In fact, Harry felt brilliant. _Brilliant._ He wasn't feeling any of the pain he knew he should be.

He was smiling as he rose.

Piers Polkiss was on the floor before him, looking at his blackened hands, and Harry ignored him. He had his eyes on his cousin as he kicked with his left leg and a boy fell, and they remained there.

He still smiled. It wasn't strained; it was the carefree smile all seven year old children should wear.

He pushed someone with his right arm and they dropped like a corpse.

Moving forward the tides parted, and he began to sing as he put his hands around his cousin's throat.

"Watch him run – make him squeal – make him curl like orange – peel -" He was crying. "Make him – dance – pull – _his – tie_ – kick him til he – til he - "

_Dies?

* * *

_

Miss Knight was extremely popular in the all male junior school. She was young and cheerful, and many an 'injury' required her grave attention every lunch time. She regularly smiled, at everyone, and sent the brave young boys off with a plaster and a wink most of the time.

But Harry sat on her office bed today, and she wasn't smiling.

She felt slightly ill, her complexion as white as a ghost, as the Headmaster detailed to her what was wrong.

"…no idea how in God's name he managed it- nobody involved is saying much, as you can imagine we're having some trouble finding out who exactly _was_ involved- everyone who was is denying it and everyone who wasn't has some story or other to tell me. But – well, yes – he broke _both_ legs of Georges'. Piers suffered second degree all over his hands- he's at hospital now, Georges is on his way. Dursley will recover, just a little bruising around the throat, and shock of course. But _McDougall_… well, it looks like someone took a brick to the poor little sod's head. His face completely – Miss Knight!?"

Fortunately, Miss Knight did not require yet another ambulance there that day. She needed rest, which she got on her office bed, and a glass of water, which was handed to her by Harry.

Needless to say, the sight of a vaguely concerned Harry Potter helping her sip water did little to comfort her.

* * *

In vengeance, that evening, Vernon Dursley had waited until the officers had left and then gone to town on his nephew-by-marriage. His wife had left the room to coax Dudley out of his bedroom to some dinner.

Spatters of crimson flecked the feet of the cream sofas, for which Petunia he knew would berate him.

Forty minutes later, in the wake of his uncle's froth-mouthed wrath, Harry came back to his body to find it _hurt_.

A few things broken, he'd wager. He thought about it mildly. He knew he'd be able to heal himself, he just didn't know how. He tried to concentrate.

Sleeping was out of the question- he'd never wake up. He tried to remember the times when he'd used his skills before- it was hard, between the hazed memory of those occasions and the concussion.

He realised a nauseous few minutes later that he'd need to _feel_. When he felt, really felt, things happened. Before anything happened, he'd be in a weird floating dream-thingy, like he was now, and not feel much of anything. Then he'd feel rage, or fear, or _pain…_ and things would occur.

He consciously brought his mind back into his body. The white hot pain, the searing horror, burnt him all over as tiny pinpricks would, and his vision swam. He felt vomit cover him, and just before he tipped into the abyss with a groan of agony, he could hear the grunts and brushes of his uncle scrubbing the stains from the carpet across the hall accompany him into the comfortable black.

* * *

Six hours later he awoke.

He stretched his stiff joints, ran his fingers through his hair, and knelt to gather his things.

It didn't take long, plus he was efficient.

He opened the door of the cupboard, not consciously undoing the lock, and stared at his reflection in the moonlit hallway mirror.

Here he was.

Harry Potter.

_Harry Potter_.

Scrawny, pale and scruffy. Unscathed.

Here he was.

* * *

He didn't burn the house down, or anything so petty. He couldn't find the strength to. He simply dragged his things from the house and left it there- still, picturesque and _NORMAL_- he dragged himself and his meagre things away from there, and never saw it again.

He said no goodbye, and left no note. Everyone involved would prefer it in such a way, he knew.

He walked laboriously up the driveway and onto the road, looking at the moon. He then absently bent down, and his small hand grasped a garden gnome that was staring unseeing at Number Four. He turned it slowly until its wide, painted eyes gazed up at the moon.

With a small smile he dragged his bag away.

* * *

His bag was robbed of him long before he reached London, and by the time he got there, he was feeling things rather effectively again.

He felt _cold_. And hungry. And alone.

And nothing was happening to remedy these things.

He wandered around, trying to stick to shadows, all too aware at a so-called 'tender age' of the sorts of dangers that lurked the city streets by night.

He began to run, first with his eyes closed then soon after with the wiser choice of keeping them open, and simply ran down street after street, weaving through alleys, becoming so totally and utterly lost that he had no choice but to keep running…

And then he stopped. His heart beating belied the night's stillness.

He was staring at a dreary, pitch-black block with no unbroken windows and boarded up doorways, long decrepit and wilting, but he saw with his eyes a mansion eight storeys high with fountains and gilt windows with bricks of solid gold.

He nearly cried with joy.

He stumbled in the great oak doors of his mansion and found the downward stairs. He descended into the magnificent dungeons and basements, sure that he could explore for miles and miles and keep finding caverns and exciting crevasses.

But for now he needed sleep, and he welcomed the first chamber he found, with its huge four-poster bed and blazing fireplace.

He collapsed and slept.

* * *

When he awoke he was no longer delusional. He was, however, starving.

He focused on his need for more than two hours, tears in his eyes for some of it, and desperately tried to create food in front of him. Desperately.

Over and over again, 'Please' he'd beg to himself, and at the end of two hours labour his result was plain and simple.

_A grape_.

Needless to say he wolfed it down, and decided to get out of whatever dank, black hole he'd stumbled into to find some food for his raging stomach. It appeared as though the grape, however, that had been his own creation, had only served to fuel the acids in his stomach, and the pain sent him doubling over in the blackness stifling screams.

He didn't beg. He didn't even ask. He simply sighed.

Then he opened his eyes.

In front of him was a roast turkey. An entire, _huge_ roast turkey... Just sitting on the floor.

_Is this real? Did I do this?_

A growl from his stomach.

He looked around him… nobody was near.

He looked back at the food. The _most food he'd ever seen in real life_.

He reached out and touched it. It was solid- slightly greasy.

He put a sliver of turkey between his fingers… reached towards his mouth… and tasted it.

_It was heaven._

Harry Potter had found his God in Magic. He'd found his Faith in Self.

* * *

Not long afterwards, Harry left his underground dungeon. He wasn't surprised his dream-mansion hadn't been what he'd believed, and felt little remorse over it. Once again, despite his recent lapses, Harry felt the borders between Dream and Reality strengthening.

It was almost as though he'd rediscovered his strength.

He began to forage and explore- for nothing particular at first, but gradually he found things that might be of use. Some of the things he'd later laugh at and throw away, but it was a start.

Clothes, for example- ripped or worn ones thrown out the back of department stores. Their industrial sized rubbish bins a goldmine for Harry. Things he found on the street that he thought might be of use- a shower curtain, a bucket and a screwed up tourist map of London.

When he returned to his new home, he found that in the light it wasn't all that bad. Inside was what had once been a bookshop, and a few old volumes still loitered on the mostly-broken shelves. Figuring he had little better to do, he'd collected as many as he could carry and taken them down to his basement. If nothing else he'd use them for fires.

Using the cleanest blanket he could find he made a sort of nest out of his new acquisitions, covering them all up with it and making a depression in the middle. He then looked at the books he had brought down.

Most were useless- tourist travel guides, old fiction novels, and the like- but some he thought might be useful. He picked a survival one to read and burnt one of the romance novels using one of the disposable lighters he'd foraged. It didn't last long but it kept him warm and gave him light.

He read like that for most of them, occasionally eating or drinking his own food in between or going out to look for something he'd decided he might need, and in this way over the next weeks he made his way through about sixteen books. Some were on survival; some were on self-sufficiency, two on hiding and one very obscure one was about the art, science and psychology of stealing. He kept most of them under his blanket for future reading.

* * *

The back of his head hit the ground, hard. It wasn't solid concrete but the asphalt cut his scalp.

This was not the first time the street kids (being between six and sixteen) had picked on him- it was merely the first time with this kid.

Harry knew that to survive he'd have to find a way to fight them- to start hitting back- but he had no idea how.

Without using his skills, which were unreliable at best and fatal at worst, he was all but helpless.

He took a punch to the eye.

He stood up again, trying to ready himself, thinking of how he might defend himself, when the other boy picked up a plank of wood. Harry sighed, and covered his head with his hands to try to soften the blow.

He went down again, and stayed down.

* * *

His key find a few days earlier had been a discarded set of 48 church candles, none of them used, and so he now sat in a small altar of light reading a book entitled 'Meditation and You', when a small ruffling drew his attention.

His candles flickered and he looked up, and then jumped out of his skin in surprise.

Not ten feet in front of him stood a strange old man.

Having the memories he had of old men trouncing around his old home in the midst of the night, he shot to his feet and swept out from under his feet a chunk of wood shaped like a club which had broken glass and nails in. It was what he used to fight off drunken tramps when they moved into his basement, and it was reasonably effective.

He stood for a moment, both were silent, Harry was audibly breathing however.

"Who are you?" he asked suddenly.

The old man merely looked at him. He had thin eyes and a small smile.

"Get out!" Harry brandished his club.

"Do you like to read?"

"What?"

"Do you like to read, I asked."

He had a crisp, clear voice that sounded older than he looked.

"What's it to you!?"

"I'm curious."

Silence. Harry was unnerved and frightened.

"I'm quite harmless, and it was a simple ques-"

He'd taken a step forward and Harry had taken one himself, raising his club.

The old man smiled, saying, "Good. You are brave."

"Get – get out…"

The old man bowed, and stepped back. He then turned around. Before he reached the cellar stairs, he leant over and placed on the floor a package wrapped in cloth.

He walked up the stairs and left.

For that whole night Harry sat, staring at the stairs, wide awake. At dawn he'd picked up the package and opened it- a book. An old, leather one entitled _Walking like Shadow.

* * *

_

In between the famous and not-so-famous streets of England's capital, a labyrinth of unsavoury alleys ran crooked and unending. What plagued these streets were not rats of the four-legged kind.

There were a few child gangs, but not many- it was a dog-eat-dog survival instinct and as children they did not reproduce to replace their lost numbers. A few nasty sets of four or five kids, who wandered the streets trying to both survive and reign their patch of self-proclaimed territory, and the only real threat these were was to market vendors and smaller gangs.

They were a definite threat to Harry.

Also, although not so much on the streets as in the buildings that separated them, were realer and more deadly gangs of adults who liked to make money. But these gang members wore suits sometimes, or normal work-clothes, and were older- they saw no threat in Harry so they became no threat _to_ him. He got along with some of them. Mundy, for instance, ran the Baker Street gambling ring, and occasionally slipped Harry a cigar which he then traded to a tramp for a useful trinket, or to another adult for information.

As the weeks passed he became acquainted with many of the half-crazed animals that wondered the streets, including discarded dogs, cats, and even urban foxes. He also knew the unpleasant company of half-drunk tramps and peddlers, who stank of disgusting consumer chemicals who Aunt Petunia would not have let anywhere near her house.

He preferred the four-legged kind of animal- although vicious they were simpler.

By night, alone in his small sanctum below the dingy old building, he'd practise his skills. Having read and relating to the books on Chi and far-east senses of existence, he liked to call his skills his Art. He was learning, or attempting, to control it more. To be able to use it at will. But it was extremely difficult, and not something which was as easy as it looked in television shows he'd watched when younger.

Nonetheless he kept trying. Despite how he'd really _need_ something for it to be effective- despite how he'd have to _feel_.

It unnerved him and every time he failed he wondered if he'd been imagining it… if he wasn't at all special after all, and it was all in his head…

* * *

He was running again.

In his one-armed old backpack he'd put his foraging for the day- meagre as it may have been. The Southwark gang decided they wanted what he'd got. And, so, he was running.

He clenched his eyes and fists, trying to do what he'd done last week and find himself somewhere a few roads away, out of reach, to be as elusive as he needed to be… but there was no luck.

So he kept running.

He didn't have the energy to keep healing himself… and what's worse, if the pain wasn't excruciatingly bad, he sometimes found he couldn't do it.

He took a turning and knew he'd chosen wrong- this was not a route he knew. He looked for somewhere to hide and knew he was running out of options. He spotted a door propped open to the back of a shop or restaurant. Taking the chance, he dodged inside, letting the door close behind him as he kicked out the stopper.

He panted, getting his breath back, facing the door on his knees and gulping air. For a long time he seemed to stay like that, waiting until it might be safe.

He was frightened out of his wits again when a voice said, "Who's intruding now?"

He span around and there towering over him stood that same old man who'd been in his sanctum weeks before, same bemused little smile, same patient stance.

He knew he was without a weapon and prayed he'd not need one. The old man seemed to sense this.

"Relax," he said. "I'll not hurt you, nor will anyone else in here."

Harry caught his breath, "Right. I'll leave in a second. I'm sorry."

"That's alright. I see you fighting a lot."

Harry scowled.

"You see me losing a lot."

The old man nodded, saying, "True. It is not always best to fight."

Harry made a noise of disgust, then stood and opened the door. _Praise be_, he thought when he saw the alley was empty. He stepped out.

That infuriatingly calm voice carried out after him.

"Do you have a name, non-fighter?"

He whirled around; "Don't make fun of me!" he spat.

The old man, who in the light looked slightly implacably foreign, came to the doorway, "Do not misunderstand me. To not fight is wiser often than to fight. But if you disagree- my door is always open. And if you will not give yourself a name, I shall myself. I'll name you _Shujin_, and say goodbye."

The door closed slowly. Harry was left standing there, shaking his head in bewilderment.

He'd started running again, but quietly- like a shadow- utilising the techniques he'd learnt in a certain book.

* * *

Things were moving in the underworld.

An unseen current was getting swifter and the darkness was becoming blacker.

Robert Hume, who had gone by the alias of Hamlet, had been assassinated. Lots of people are assassinated in London, but very few of them are Robert Hume. Very few of them are all but King in the criminal underworld.

He'd been called Hades before, and Satan, but really his title had been Ruthless, or Efficient, or Cunning. Nobody called him these things but most knew them.

Hamlet had been thirty nine when he'd been shot dead in the back seat of his car. He'd held flowers in his hands- a simple arrangement for his mother on her death bed- and been blown to pieces by a sub-automatic weapon pointed in through the window.

Their mother had died… and Charlie Hume had decided to take the throne.

Things were beginning to move _very _swiftly in the underworld.

_Knock - Knock_.

The door swung open.

"Hello, Shujin."

"Er – Hi…"

Harry had been fighting again. And losing again. His latest prize, two wads of money he'd pick pocketed, had been mugged from him.

"Can I help you?"

"Well – er – you said a few weeks ago… if I disagree… with not fighting – or something. I don't understand."

The man smiled, but did not let him in.

"I said that to not fight can be wise. I said if you disagree, to come and see me. Do you disagree with me?"

"No – yes – er… well, it might be wise – to fight – I think… sometimes…"

"Hmm," he leant forward slightly. "Why?"

Harry spat blood onto the floor.

"Because you don't feel too wise when your head's been kicked in because you've got shit all idea how to defend yourself and every single fuckin' thing you try to gain for yourself is fuckin' stolen from you by bigger kids than you, and you're on your damn own, and nobody bloody else is looking out for you if there were any who ever were, and you're just – just so fuckin' sick of being treated like shit."

The old man nodded, and said, "Eloquent," then stepped aside and let Harry stumble in.

He sat him down and made him some strange hot drink which Harry didn't like but drank anyway. He said very little until he sat down opposite, after bathing Harry's cut face.

"Shujin - "

Harry snorted, "Hey, Mister, my name's Harry."

The old man frowned. He insisted, "_Shujin_ – I have but two rules."

Harry looked at him.

"What are they?"

"One: Do not lie to me."

Harry scowled at him, "You already seem to know everything about me, what would be the point in-"

"I'm not saying tell me everything- just do not, ever tell me an untruth. Yes or no."

"Er – well, yeah, ok."

"Two: _Try_ your very hardest to do as I tell you. Even if you know you can't, try anyway, and keep trying."

Harry looked at the grizzled old man, and agreed. He then asked, "What's your name then, if we're going to do this?"

"I'm afraid, Shujin, that all you may know me as from hereon is _Sensei._"

* * *

That had been six months ago.

In his cellar now, Harry was practising. He was always in practise now, he understood.

Eating, drinking, exercising, reading, meditating, learning, running, fighting- even living itself.

It was all practise.

It was all training.

His Sensei was, apparently, teaching him some basic and advanced techniques, methods and moves of both Karate and Muay Thai. Both are striking arts, Karate primarily for self-defence and Muay Thai for offence. He also took him through exercises and rituals of Tai Chi and other, abstract forms- teaching Harry to limber up, learn of and control every single part of his body. He was promising to, once he'd proved adept at his other exercises, teach him Kung Fu also.

He was being trained- not to fight, simply. He was being taught to survive. London was a rough place- he knew it better than most children his age.

He was also learning a lot about himself.

So here he meditated- he'd been practising his Art occasionally (he hadn't told his sensei about that), but for now he meditated. He was completely alone.

In his one self.

At peace.

And then a gunshot rang out.

Harry had opened his eyes, heart beating slowly and placidly, and looked at the ceiling of the basement.

Something thudded onto the floor in the room above, and footsteps moved around.

He sat there, in dead quiet, and apart from snuffing the candles he made no movement or noise.

There was more movement, the sound of voices-_ laughter_ maybe- and then the strangers left. Harry had little doubt they'd left someone behind.

* * *

A single, small red hole in Mundy's cheekbone and the mess of his inner-head decorating the wall and floorboards were all that gave Harry the clue that he was dead.

His face looked oddly at peace, only his teeth were forever bared in a grimace that resembled his grizzled half-smile. His eyes were open.

Harry didn't feel particularly sad. He didn't feel much of anything. He was confused, mostly, as to why Mundy had been shot in the head. And as to why in his house. And as to why tonight.

He knew some of Mundy's associates would be hugely displeased to learn of his death, and didn't envy being the shooter.

Harry heard the front doorway rattle as someone stepped through it again. He moved swiftly and silently to the cabinet in the corner of the room, and slipped into the dusty shadows beneath it, breathing quietly, waiting with wide eyes to see what would happen.

Creaks in the floor would have told Harry that this new stranger had entered the room, even if he couldn't see his feet. He heard the new man sigh, grunt, and walk around the room.

First he went to the staircase leading up, and went up halfway, listening in the quiet to the dilapidated rooms above for signs of life. Harry watched him until he was out of sight.

After a few moments that felt like an age, the stranger descended again, and moved to Harry's basement staircase.

Harry felt panic. He knew he'd have to do something- people couldn't find him here- and tried to feel fear and anger at this intruder, letting it build inside him so he could use his skills.

But the stranger didn't go down- he put his hand on the doorframe and leant into the darkness above the stairs, his feet still in the room, and hung there.

Another few seconds went by, Harry forcing himself to calm.

The stranger whistled into the blackness of downstairs, and when no reply was made, he pulled himself into the room again and dusted himself off.

Harry felt cool, cold relief wash over him.

The figure shuffled to where Mundy lay, and prodded his still face with a foot. He sighed.

"Waste of a good fuckin' bullet, if you ask me, Jack."

He put his hands up near his face, and lit up what Harry guessed must be a cigarette. He then bent down; it clenched between his teeth, he grasped the fresh corpse under its armpits.

Mundy's half-a-head lolled horribly on its neck as it was dragged away.

For what Harry counted to be ten whole minutes he stayed under there, silent as the shallow grave Mundy would soon occupy, waiting.

Nobody came back, that night.

He crawled out, brushing himself free of the cobwebs all over his foraged clothes. He looked up and went to stride back downstairs, but suddenly something glinted in the moonlight and caught his eye.

He stepped backwards, looking around the room, trying to see it again.

_There_. Under the bookshelf in the corner. Harry went to it and picked it up- the gun weighed heavily in his small hands.

It was Mundy's revolver- Harry had seen the hilt in the back of his jeans when he'd stretched- and now Mundy didn't need it.

But Harry might.

He knew better than to fiddle with it- too many things could go wrong. He put it on the old, dusty cash counter and went to the sport section of the old shop. Unfortunately, he couldn't find anything on handguns.

He took it with an outstretched arm down to his nest.

* * *

"Shujin," the old man murmured.

He'd brought Harry to the rooftop of his building in the middle of the night- Harry's first time on a roof- and had been going through all of his sitting exercises he'd taught him to round off the vigorous training they'd been doing. Apparently, today was the day he was going to begin teaching him Kung Fu.

But his sensei needed him ready.

So here they sat, eyes closed, immersed in meditation and calming themselves on the roof. It was here that his Sensei again murmured, "Shujin."

"Yes, sensei," Harry said, eyes still closed and not really in his own body.

"Today you learn yourself. You will find a harmony that exists within you and learn to use it to your advantage. Now you will find this peace. Slowly, open your eyes."

Harry did so. And he wept.

There, cross-legged on a London rooftop, Harry saw the sunrise for the first time he could remember. Harry saw all the flashes of purple, pink, red, orange, yellow, blue and everything in between that encompassed the Horizon. He did not see the chimneys of London, the train tracks in the distance, the grey buildings. He saw only colour.

He wept and the colours blurred and became even more magnificent. Still half-subconscious, having been so deep in meditation, the palette of sunrise painted his very soul.

He stared until the sky was blue, then found himself with a wet face, standing up, arms outstretched.

He was unnerved, yet it felt so true and right that nothing could really take away the incredible feeling he'd gained. A new weightlessness. A new sense of sight. A new sense of purpose.

"Now you understand, Shujin," a voice said. "Now, I teach you all I know."


	3. The Woman Called Pandora

Murray spat again.

His gang stood to either side of him, reminding Harry somehow of a past life, and there they stayed, jeering and taunting.

But not Murray; Murray at 15 was the leader. He was watching Harry with narrowed eyes.

"Why ain't yeh runnin', prick?"

Harry shrugged, looking at the two walls he'd been cornered into.

"Nowhere to run- Nothing on me worth stealing," he said.

He was lying. His bag was filled with an entire day's foraging. And he needed it.

Murray sneered, "Bollocks."

His gang came first, as they always did, but today Harry decided that he'd like to keep his farmed collection. With a few choice manoeuvres he'd beaten down two of them and he set off at a run towards the other end of the alley.

"He's runnin' at a dead end, the dipshit!" One shouted, laughing.

But Harry knew this. In fact, he knew exactly where this dead end joined up with, even if the gang chasing him didn't. The reason he'd run here was to lob the bag on his back over the wall to safety, where he could collect it later- he couldn't defend himself with it weighing him down.

He did it with a heave, then spun to face the oncoming kids- Murray had realised what he'd been doing. He saw the kid swear.

The rest of the gang slowed their runs but Murray came on full pelt, howling like a hyena, and the gang cheered as he raised his flying fist and brought it down to where Harry's head had been moments before.

Before Murray knew what was happening he'd had his ribs broken and been winded, so that he couldn't even cry out when he felt the _crunch_ of his nose being smashed into his face. He gargled instead.

That too stopped, along with the gang's cheering, when Harry stamped on his throat.

* * *

He still thieved a little nowadays, despite having learnt the value of honour- but never from legitimate people. Only ever from other criminals.

He had become adept at conjuring food, so now didn't need to sustain his self with stolen money, and rarely had to heal himself now he knew basic defence. Some gangs no longer bothered him, some gangs especially did.

He'd taken the 'everything you do is training' to heart, and kept very fit and lithe in the few months he'd been taught by his sensei, eating extremely healthily and cleansing his body of impurities, despite his shoddy outward appearance.

He'd also found a new jacket, and Harry was _very_ proud of it.

It was a sort of leather trench-coat, brown, with sheep skin insides that fit him perfectly. It was snug and long, and he went absolutely everywhere with it from when he found it in a stall in Camden. It barely brushed the pavement as he walked, despite his short stature.

He was extremely proud of it. It was one of the few articles of clothing he owned that he knew he'd keep, not throw away, no matter how dirty or messed up it got. The other articles were his boots, but that's because his size was hard to find.

Then one day his sensei did not meet him for training.

Harry was ten when his Sensei died.

He went to the place he'd found him first time, as quickly as he could, fearing the worst. He'd been right. A large Asian family was in the house, but his Sensei wasn't.

A stern-looking elderly woman with tanned skin answered him when he knocked, and confirmed his suspicions were true. Somehow, through she was not forthcoming with details, his sensei had perished.

He felt extremely sad and asked on the off-chance his sensei had left anything for him- a note or something.

"Name?"

"Harry," he answered.

"No, nothing for any Harry," she told him. "Anything else?"

Harry had looked down, torn up inside at this strange, surrogate guardian suddenly disappearing. He shook his head and turned away, and the door closed behind him.

He'd not left him any note of explanation- nothing at all for him. He was being selfish he knew, the old man had his entire family in there, and Harry was thinking only of himself.

Himself.

_Him…_ "Oh, fuck, you idiot Harry-"

He turned and ran to the door, knocking again.

The same woman answered and regarded him in a bored way.

"Sorry- he… he called me Shujin. That's the name he gave me. I didn't realise -"

But the old woman was looking at him strangely. Almost as though she could not believe what he'd said.

"_You_ are Shujin?"

"Yes..?"

She sniffed, looking him up and down, and said, "Wait."

He did for a short while, curious, on the doorstep. He heard the pigeons nearby cooing without really hearing them. Then she returned.

She handed him a 2 cloth packages, one quite long and thin, and around the middle was wrapped a curled sheet of paper, the other one a wrapped up book.

Harry stuck these things under his coat and made his way back home. He then unfurled the note in his nest by candlelight- a letter from his Sensei.

_Shujin,_

_If you are reading this, I may let you know that my birth name is Mito Nobunaga. I saw something in you that is hard to describe- I'd seen your resilience, and a spark in your eye absent in those of your peers. I wish you the best of luck on your journey. Remember the lessons I taught you, for they will aide you in times to come. I leave to you one of the few things I believe you will value, and instructions for it._

_Mito Nobunaga  
__Sensei_

Harry felled a few tears but did not dwell on it.

For once a death was not his fault- and the memory of the kind, strange old man was something to be honoured and cherished. His family could mourn him. Harry hadn't known him well enough- all he could do was honour what he'd been taught.

He opened the book's wrapping and saw the title, 'The Secret of Swordplay' embossed in gold leaf.

He opened the long, thin package, and beheld a beautiful sword. It was Japanese style, a Katana, but he would not know that until he opened the book. He pulled the blade out, saw how sharp it was, and put it back swiftly.

He placed it under his blanket, near where his head would be in the night, and began to read.

* * *

Ten months later, Harry had spent his time learning the forms and techniques of the sword, but he did not have the chance to practise with anyone.

He continued to practise his Art, becoming more focused and more adept. He practised Martial Arts with himself and on the ones foolish enough to attack him in the street. He meditated a lot. And read.

But he was always alone.

His hovel, the basement sanctum he'd spent two years of his life in, had been burnt down. The mob using it to execute their enemies had finally found somewhere better, and had destroyed the evidence. Harry had been in the nest at the time, and had quickly run up the stairs and stuck his hand into the blazing room.

The pain he'd used to conjure a barrier between the inferno in the room and the cellar staircase.

He'd forced as much as he could take that he treasured into the blanket- about ten books, the sword, a few other bits and pieces from all over (not clothes which could be re-stolen) and had thrown his boots and jacket on and stuffed the gun into one of the big inside pockets of the coat. Dragging the makeshift sack, he'd pushed it through a broken grate in the far side of the basement ceiling, and climbed up himself.

He'd stood there, watching it burn, healing his hand. There hadn't been any goodbye or anything- he'd simply had to walk on.

Eventually he'd learnt to repair and clean his clothes with the art.

He'd stolen from a leather hiding shop a large black carry-bag, and kept his things in there until he eventually modded his long jacket himself. Once he'd done it, he no longer needed a bag- a pouch from the inside back of the coat went right into the lining, and in it he kept books, a few clothes and various other tools. He could only reach the pouch by taking off the coat, but this suited him fine- if he couldn't reach it himself, neither could anyone mugging him.

He fashioned a makeshift holster for the gun in the back of his belt out of old wire hangers. He sewed the sheath for his sword into the inside lining of his coat and made a slit with it in the top so that the tip of the hilt peaked through, able to be reached and drawn from inside the coat. He'd made the pockets bigger anyway too.

He was very pleased with his modifications indeed. The only downside to wearing his coat was that he'd usually need to travel by night. This suited him fine once he'd adjusted to it though.

It had been eleven months now of mere survival; moving from location to location, always in or around London town, travelling where and how he could and rummaging everywhere for a place to spend the night.

He mostly now lived on the rooftops of London- he usually only went down to cross to the next building if he couldn't from the top, or if he needed something.

It was a strange, mobile lifestyle, always being on his feet, and not the sort of life many ten year olds ever get- or want- to experience.

He didn't think about it too much.

Although he'd changed a huge amount since that night, he still saw himself standing scruffy and scrawny in the moonlit hallway of Number Four, Privet Drive, and when times got tough he'd still repeat his mantra to himself.

"Here I am. I am Harry Potter. Here I am."

* * *

Harry was laying wide awake on a rooftop in Camden, thinking to himself about life.

His jacket was stretched out under his head and he was looking up at the grey sky, earring dangling from his left ear, puffing lazily on a cigarette. He could hear birds.

_What the fuck am I going to do with my life?_ He wondered. _Just keep going from scrape to scrape until one day I fuck up and some other guiltless little scavenger pries my gear from my corpse?_

Harry had spent a lot of time in the company of very deranged, yet very sophisticated men. While his still-young voice stumbled over the cascading sentences he'd picked up, his mind worked and whirred with a deeper voice inside it, one that spoke in a more mature way and made his brain work faster.

_Or do I find something to do with it? I don't need money, because I am self-sustaining. What do I need? A home? Company?_ He sneered at both options. _Company and I would never get along. And I watched the last place I called home burn to the ground._

He took a last drag and flicked the butt over the ledge.

_Do I exercise my contacts and get into the mob?_

For what though?

Harry didn't desire riches. He wasn't greedy. He'd deliberately moved from a slightly comfortable sub-urban home into the life of a drifter. It was willing. Looking back, he'd have done the same thing. Many of his companions on the street couldn't boast that- they craved a comfortable life that few of them had ever sampled.

Thinking things like that made Harry feel extremely selfish.

_Why get into the mob? Well,_ he thought, _relieves boredom I suppose. Would give me things to do, I'd meet new people._

He considered.

_I'd probably have to kill people too. But I've never had a problem with that before…_

Although Harry knew this was a lie- that he'd only ever hurt people when they'd hurt him first- he didn't correct himself.

_Then again, I'm too young to be considered. They won't take me seriously for years, and that doesn't help me out in the present. Maybe after a few years,_ he thought. Then he groaned- _Even that could go wrong! If I got caught by the police I'd end up in jail. They'd take my things and make me stay in one place for the rest of my life. I'd never have any freedom again._

He put a hand across his eyes, grinding his teeth. He'd considered going into sports (but with what training), joining the police (like they'd take him), joining the Army (fat chance), and numerous other things. Mostly it boiled down to him being too young to be taken seriously.

Harry would never admit it, but what he desired was a place to _belong_… and the most common place that people his age belonged was school.

He spat and sat up.

_Can't go to boarding school without money, can't get money without a job, and can't get a job without school._

Once in a while, to amuse himself, he would entertain the thought of paying a small visit to the Dursley household.

He stood and swung his jacket over his shoulders, organising the position of his sword and gun, then took out another cigarette and lit it up. He moved towards the edge of the building where the ladder was.

Camden Market in the summer was one of the few places in London (other than Hyde Park at night) he could walk around completely as himself and not draw strange looks. Everyone in Camden wore strange clothes, most of them smelt, and nearly all were armed in some way. Despite his size, the trench coat was not an irregular feature of Camden's denizens.

Not sure he was hungry enough to conjure food but feeling peckish nonetheless, he accepted the samples from the food sellers in a row along the Lock, and walked by the water debating with his self as to where exactly he was gong to go from here.

He was planning how to get up on one building, looking at the alleys around it, when he came across Davey and a young woman.

Harry did not like Davey- this was no secret. Despite him being sprawled out across the screaming girl, from the leather jacket alone he could tell it was him. His hair was the same long, lank blonde it had always been. It was no secret that Harry hated Davey because he'd once tried to cut his tongue out, and nearly succeeded.

Harry hadn't seen Davey since then- a night a few months before when Davey had been selling drugs to schoolchildren and Harry had come along, broken it up, and Davey had tried to shoot him. Harry had taken offence. He'd run when sirens came though.

Davey could have been any age between 18 and 28- he'd always worn that leather jacket with I.N.R.I. scrawled across the back in Tipex. Whatever age he was, Harry knew he'd have to remain it forever today.

Despite merely being an appalling person, like so many others like him, Harry decided Davey's judgement today for two reasons. One- he was raping someone. Two- He made trench coats look bad.

He wasn't sure what fact pissed him off more.

Instead of politely waiting for Davey to finish, Harry kicked him in the side of the head, catching and tearing his ear slightly. He screamed in surprise, but being as drugged up as he no doubt was he didn't actually feel a thing. He got to his feet, his leather trousers halfway down his legs, trench coat wavering in the wind and a knife in his hand.

Harry noticed the young gothic girl he'd attacked run off out of the corner of his eye and knew he wouldn't have long. Timing coupled with the eight-inch knife in Davey's hand and the wild, lustful look in his eyes to make Harry's choice.

_Gun over sword._

Harry drew and pointed.

"Goodbye Davey," he said.

* * *

As it turned out, Davey had more friends than Harry had given him credit for, and when his friends had found him face-down in the lock with a hole in his chest, Harry had made the swift and easy decision to not return to Camden at any point in the near future.

Meanwhile, Harry was moving again, and getting fast tired of it. He was scouting out a possible residence at about 4:00 am when something extremely odd happened.

Despite where he'd been hiding, behind a dumpster in a dark alley, somehow some bloody pigeon found him there and tried to perch on him.

"Oi," he whispered, batting it away, "Stop trying to shit all over my jacket- fuck off, bird. _Fuck off._"

But the bird didn't, and Harry realised then that it wasn't a pigeon- it was an owl.

"What in the name of – _ow, _Christ," He shouted, when it landed on his shoulder and sank its talons into him.

The bird dropped something into his lap and for a minute Harry thought he'd kill and roast the thing for crapping all over his coat, when he realised that it wasn't bird shit… it was a letter…

For a long moment he sat there, not quite sure what he was seeing.

He looked up and the owl was gone. Nobody else was around.

He looked down, and sure enough he was looking at a letter the owl had dropped. _What,_ he thought, _you flying rats forage in people's mail boxes now?_

He inspected the seal on the back of it, which was strange and intricate. Harry hadn't seen a physical letter in a long time- in fact, the last one he'd seen had been his Sensei's all that long ago. Half-heartedly, before he threw it away, he turned it over to see if the address on it was near here.

He sat staring for a few moments, then turned it back over and tilted his head up with his eyes closed.

"I'm tired," he told the empty alley.

He turned it over and peered down at it again, and sure enough, despite the lack of daylight it said it on there clear as day… the address on it being not just _near_ here, but _right where he was sitting_.

_Harry Potter,  
__Next to the Dumpster of No. 71,  
__Copenhagen Street,  
__London._

Before he opened the letter he ran quite a long way- past King's Cross station and on towards East London. He had no idea where they were watching from.

_If they've got Helicopters_ _I'm fucked, _he thought.

When he was under a canopy in God-knows-where he caught his breath, and decided that the only way he'd know what was going on was to open the letter. He stared wide-eyed around him, then triple-checked the name on the front was his.

It was.

He opened the letter quickly, in no mood for it, and folded out the thick paper inside.

He read two lines into it before he looked up again, staring around him. He was frightened, angry and unnerved.

_And when I find out who's done this, I'll rip their fucking eyes out,_ he vowed.

He got out his lighter and set fire to the so-called 'letter', making sure it was burnt to ashes on the pavement before moving on.

He kept walking through the day- he didn't stop for a great many hours afterwards.

* * *

It was another week before Harry thought about the contents of the letter.

His jacket had been mugged from him by two young black men in business suits, both with identical bald heads and tattoos of a jet black ring around their left eyes.

Despite his best efforts, Harry had been beaten to within an inch of his life. He'd hardly been conscious as they'd stripped him of the coat and sword, but even as they bundled him into the boot of a pristine-smelling car they hadn't noticed the gun in the back of his belt.

He'd had a long journey to consider the contents of the letter, in the pitch black, healing himself absently. _What if..? _He'd never considered the things he'd done Magic- or himself a Wizard. Those things weren't real. They were fantasy.

When they reached the Greenwich Docks in the middle of the nights and opened the boot to dispose of the kid's corpse, what met them was a severely pissed off Harry Potter with a snub nosed revolver, without a scratch on him and not even a speck of blood on his clothes.

The first one was shot cleanly right through the middle of that black circle ringing his eye. The top of his head exploded in a cloud of red.

_What if..?_

The second one reacted quickly however, and the first shot rocketed miles over his shoulder. The second went through his hand. The third clacked on empty.

"Shit," Harry grunted, diving out of the boot onto the body of the first one. His spares were in his coat. He threw the revolver at the second man, who was struggling one-handed to get his gun from his shoulder-holster. It hit him on the back of the head but he barely even flinched.

_What if..?_

With his two good hands Harry whipped the modified Colt .45 from the dead man's coat, and dived behind the side of the car out of sight of the other man so he could figure out the safety on the fucking thing.

He anticipated and rolled under the bottom of the car, just as a shot rang off where his head had been not a second before as the second assailant dove around the car. He tried to aim at the bastard's feet but the man jumped on the bonnet.

Stalemate, for the moment. _What if… there's more than this?_

The man stuck his gun under the bottom of the car from the bonnet, and got off one shot that rocketed into the floor with a whip crack in the enclosed space. Harry leant over before another could be loosed, and grabbed the pistol pointing at him.

He'd been going to try to snatch the gun from the black man's hand, but the grip was too strong. What happened was, however, satisfactory- Harry's grip on the body of the gun as the assailant had pulled his hand back quickly had slid the top piece of the gun right off the handle.

It simply slid off forwards in his hand, the very top shell of the pistol, rendering it useless. It now had no blowback, and would not work as an automatic. The bullet, because of this, had jammed in the dislodged chamber.

The man didn't seem to realise at first, pulling futilely at the trigger, so before he could understand his disadvantage Harry rolled quickly out. He knelt and reached over the bonnet at the curled up man on it, pulling the trigger in quick succession, shocked at the recoil from the modified .45.

The first bullet entered behind the man's ear at the top of the neck, lodging in the spine, and Harry thought he'd missed. The second _did _miss. The next two, however, blew portions of his left torso off, and then his final shot went careening away as the second man rolled off and hit the floor.

Harry, panting with exertion, crawled around the black car and checked the fucker was actually dead.

He was.

He dropped the .45, conscious of how quickly he'd now need to move to avoid the police, who would respond to the gunshots in a minimum response time of 3 minutes, and a maximum of 12.

He needed his belongings back first, though. He staggered to his feet and went to the door of the car, to find the window open.

Another young black man looked out from the passenger door.

There was a moment of frozen, suspended disbelief.

"Fuck," Harry swore- he didn't have the gun. If the man was armed and he dived for it, he'd be dead before he hit the floor.

A few seconds passed, Harry utterly terrified, thinking that the only way he might escape this mess was to use his Art, consequences be damned.

The young man with a ring around his eye spoke quietly to him. Harry didn't register at first. Then it came through.

"That was... interesting."

* * *

They sped away from the docks as blue lights lit up the streets not far away.

Harry had decided he was back in the state he'd been in before- where his mind's fragile walls separating Real from Surreal… and Sane from Insane… had shattered.

He sat next to the perfectly composed young man, who'd given his name as Sharif. He held in his hands his sword. Not his coat- Sharif said they'd left that where they'd found him. He stared out the window.

"But if," Sharif was saying, "I'd had the slightest idea you might still be alive we'd have left you there. Whatever you did to heal yourself was very curious indeed- you must show me some time… almost as curious as a young boy such as yourself besting two high ranking members of the Marksmen. I have a feeling you shall prove to be a _most_ curious acquaintance."

His tone was clipped and cultural, but completely friendly and polite, as though what had happened at the dock really had been a queer delusion.

"But once again, my sincere apologies at this entire debacle; Richard and Ali are not usually so violent, but I believe they wanted some form of release after being told they were downgraded to guardian duty for the month for their atrocious behaviour at the restaurant the other night- do excuse me going on," he sighed, "When we turned up and they were there, there was nothing I could do by that stage. I told them to put you in the back and that I'd deal with them later."

He regarded Harry out of his almond eyes, saying, "I suppose I won't need to now though."

"Right," was all Harry said.

"Hmm. Let's find your coat, if you do really want it back, then I'll take you to Pandora and we can decide what to do with you, strange boy-with-sword."

* * *

Harry's coat had disappeared, to his chagrin, but Sharif had merely tutted and said, "Well, I'll reimburse you that much I should think. A new wardrobe, or at least outfit, would not go amiss."

He'd ordered his driver, who Harry barely acknowledged, to take them to this mysterious Pandora. He was furious with himself for not noticing the man in the car through that firefight. _That fucking mistake will probably cost me my life._

It turned out that Pandora was not a person- it was a club. A nightclub in London. Apparently, Sharif owned it. The bouncers did not even glance at the young boy who entered the club behind him; they merely moved the velvet rope back into place behind them.

Harry clutched his sword close.

They moved through various rooms, or 'boxes' as Sharif liked to call them. Gradually the crowds thinned around them as they moved deeper. Then the club became a series of dim hallways.

At the end of one, Sharif turned to Harry.

"Wait here," he said. "I'll be back in a moment."

Harry sat on a purple cushioned sofa, closing his eyes. It seemed like the very beat Sharif had left when the door opened and he summoned him in. He struggled to his feet and swallowed, then walked through.

A young white woman with thick, cropped black hair waited for him there. She regarded him dispassionately, uninterested, and asked, "Who are you?"

Harry stayed silent, but when it became apparent they'd not leave until he answered, he told them, "Shujin."

The woman frowned. She breathed, and said, "Alright. Why did you kill two of my men?"

Harry considered. Then he burst out laughing. He went onto all fours, heaving with laughter, dropping his sword, creased up and in fits. Tears ran from his eyes.

The woman regarded Sharif coldly.

"Is this a joke?"

Sharif gulped, and cleared his throat, "Ahem- no, it wasn't. He just bested two of _your_ best, though, it's taken something out of him, no doubt. He's - "

"Get out, Sharif."

He bowed and complied.

When Harry resurfaced, he went to his knees, then sat cross legged, his eyes closed. Eventually he opened them to find the woman looking at him with a weary expression.

"How old are you, Shujin?"

Harry had to think for a long moment. He asked her, "What's the date?"

"2nd August. 1991."

"I suppose I'm eleven then. It was my birthday."

"You don't have the accent of a street-urchin. Where are you from?"

"Surrey, ages ago."

"Alright, why did you leave?"

He didn't answer.

She rubbed her eyes, continuing, "Do you live anywhere now?"

He shook his head.

"How did you manage to kill Richard and Ali?"

"The gun helped."

She didn't smile.

"Ali was my Godson."

"Ok," he simply said.

She shook her head, saying, "Right. Well, we'll compensate you somewhat, but not too much- you don't look much hurt. I now am short two Marksmen. I want you to get out of here, soon, and if I see you again I'll murder you myself."

"Ok," he repeated.

He left the room.

Sharif waited for him outside.

"What did you say to her?"

"My name and age. Shujin, and 11. And that I came from Surrey. And that I shot her Godson with a gun, but she already knew that."

Sharif shook his head, saying, "Curious again, little Shujin. You're still alive. How strangely fortunate for you."

He led him away, down another corridor and up some stairs, Harry blindly following. He took him to a simple room… but it was lavish and extravagant to Harry. Purple cushions, a single bed, a window. He might have cried.

"I'll return to you in the morning and we'll get you tailored. Perhaps. Then I'd best drop you back in Surrey. You'll be fed in the morning."

He left, and Harry slept on the floor for a few hours. Before dawn he rose, tore some strips from the bedcovers and wrapped up his sword.

He walked out, and away, and that was fortunately his last experience for a long time with Charlie Hume's Marksmen, the forefront of criminal activity in the London underworld.


	4. The Invasive Shroud

_Many thanks to all who have reviewed- it's really very decent of you to. I will eventually reply to primary questions but it is 6 past midnight right now and I really am very busy with a whole load of shit in real life. Enjoy, have a nice week and thanks again. GL._

* * *

Just a week later Harry sat on a rooftop in Westminster. He stared with wide, preoccupied eyes at the sunrise, deep in thought.

Bathed in the pink light, in one hand he grasped the sword next to him subconsciously, and in the other he held a folded rectangle of parchment. Free from where it was usually tucked into his waistband lay his new piece on the floor in front of him. It was a chrome-plated Colt Python, one of those with a long widening barrel, and it packed a hell of a punch.

His python was empty and he was worn down. He'd had an extremely eventful evening.

* * *

That night had seen Harry near one of his usual haunts in the west of London, haggling the price of a fifty-round rack of cartridges while discreetly slipping freebies off the man's stall into his bag. 

His sword he'd left wrapped in plastic and slid up a drainpipe a few streets away. It was the most convenient hiding place he'd found to be a constant sight in London.

Walking away from the tight vendor, Harry had come across something that made him double take.

A stinking waste of a man, dressed and looking like a hairy tramp, was trying to sell _his_ jacket to a vendor just thirty yards in front of his face. Even from where he stood, Harry could see it was his- it had the same mods, the rip in the leather that allowed him to pull his sword through, the discolouration around the hem. Apart from the fact it looked dirtier and evidently had none of his belongings in it, it was unchanged.

He growled slightly, but decided to be sensible about it. If the bastard sold his jacket to this man, he'd steal it from the vendor then kill the bastard. If he didn't sell it, he'd steal it from _him_, then kill the bastard. Either way, he was certain tonight would not bode well for the bastard.

He watched discretely, smoking a cigarette, as the man tried various vendors along the row, selling not just the coat but also a huge array of items in his own jacket. Harry was occupying his time thinking of creative ways to exact revenge on him.

The old man failed to sell Harry's jacket. The boy in question tailed him through a maze of alleys, sticking to silence and shadows, repulsed by the stench of the man's tobacco but using the smell to locate him when he got too far ahead.

Further and further they went, Harry never too far behind. In crowds it was easier- he could crouch and see through people's legs whilst moving faster, without worrying about stealth. His only slip-up on the entire journey was near the beginning of it, when he kicked a tiny stone into a puddle. He'd jumped behind a set of rubbish bins, allowing the meanderings of a drunken tramp singing in the alley to cover for it, listening to the footsteps stop, then move away again to a safer distance- long enough for the man to reassure himself he wasn't being followed without Harry losing sight of him.

The moon could be seen between the tops of the buildings when the man stopped outside a dank, grimy little hovel. He approached the door, and Harry crept up behind him, planning to shoot him here and leave him on his own doorstep, when the man said something to the door.

Harry at first thought he was talking to him, that he'd been discovered, and froze with the gun levelled at the figure's back in the shadows on the other side of the alleyway.

Then the man coughed, fumbled with what Harry had assumed to be his keys, and dropped something onto the pavement. It rolled a little way out and Harry froze on catching sight of it- a thing he hadn't seen since he was seven years old, at the dentist's.

A little, polished wooden stick lay there. Grubby wooden fingers reached down and snatched it up, and Harry found his heart was in his throat. Had the moonlight shone on him you'd have seen a face whiter than a ghost's.

The man turned half to the side and Harry didn't even quiver a single muscle, finger ready on the trigger but suddenly unwilling to shoot. The old man blew on the stick, rubbed it with a filthy handkerchief, evidently valuing this strange thing hugely. Harry felt such a strong sense of foreboding swell from it he nearly shuddered.

Satisfied it was undamaged, the strange man turned back to the door, pointed the stick at it and whispered something under his breath; the door swung open in front of him. Harry withdrew the gun, watching as the figure stepped inside, silently horrified at what he'd seen.

The word _Wizard_ kept pounding itself into his head.

When it had been silent outside for a few minutes, he moved around the edges of the building, trying to see in the dark windows. He'd then sighed, making up his mind, and climbed up the side of the building a little way using a drainpipe and ledges to reach the closest window.

It had taken effort, but his adept body got him in the glassless window quickly and quietly. He'd landed in a crouch inside the dark remains of this block of flats.

The one he was in looked ruined and decrepit, so he'd stalked his way out and into the hallway, making his way downstairs silently so he could try to sense where the guy had gone. Then he picked up the proverbial scent.

He was so cautious, his blood so high, he found he could concentrate and actually sense where the trace of magic was.

He shuddered thinking it- _magic._ The word was revolting. It would always remain his _Art._

He followed it, like static in the air, and also the smell of that strange tobacco up the stairs of the flats, floor after floor of deserted homes.

Eventually, he came to a barrier of some sort. It wasn't _there_, as such, but his instinct told him something was blocking the way- he couldn't see anything but a slight blur in the air, but when he listened really hard he could feel a humming come from it. When he breathed deeply he smelt faint ozone.

He used the anger he felt in general, especially at this old reeking bastard, and with his hands he'd tried again and again to move or push the barrier using his skills. It was extremely difficult- he stood there for a good half an hour before he got anywhere.

With his eyes closed and the Art running through him, it was like trying to rip a hole in wet silk while wearing oven gloves. Again and again he tried, and could not get anywhere.

Eventually he found the solution- instead of breaking the barrier, he simply moved it.

He went to the bottom, where it started, pushed the sliding, volatile energy up, and rolled underneath.

He came to a few seconds later, panting heavily but silently, feeling slightly nauseous. He shook and waved his hands briefly to get rid of the numbness but it made no difference. When his head stopped swimming and he caught his breath back, he stood up.

Not about to trust his skills again after such exertion, when he reached the only door at the end of the corridor he listened at the wood and prepared to break in the old fashioned way.

He paused when he heard faint music coming through the door. It sounded old fashioned- not classical, but a middle-aged woman singing an upbeat song about love. The sound was odd- Harry was no expert on music, hating most of it and hearing it once a month if he was lucky, but even he could tell that the most old fashioned thing about this song was whatever was playing it. It crackled and buzzed flatly.

He dropped to his knees and hands silently and looked under the door- a light was on further into the flat, but the immediate area was dark. As he got out his small, thin metal tools, Harry prayed the door would not squeak.

Before anything else, he tried the door to check, but he was right and it was locked. This user-of-the-Art clearly wasn't above muggle methods as well as magical.

With the old music playing like the creak of a rocking chair in the background, he slipped his strips of metal into position and began to manipulate the tumblers.

Doing this silent was no easy task, so it took him a further five minutes with two restarts to open the door. There was the barest of clicks when it unlocked, and he paused, his ear to the door, before turning the handle very slightly and pushing it open.

As soon as the door had an inch of light filtering into the corridor, the music tripled in volume, making Harry grimace. What made him smile again, though, was the audible sound of someone snoring very heavily.

He pushed the door open enough for him to get through, inexorably slowly, and then poked his head around. Sure enough, there on a dingy green sofa, that same man slumbered deeply. Now Harry was this close to him, he smelt the booze as well as the stale tobacco.

The flat was larger than it looked on the outside- suspiciously so- and was decorated with unkempt wooden panelling and dusty carpets. It had elderly chintz armchairs and bits of old furniture littering the room, a three-legged coffee table in the very centre, and around the edges of the room were desks, glass cases and innumerable shelves of books. Apart from smelling musty and dank, it was not at all like what Harry had imagined it. In one corner stood a huge urn, and the only light came from a softly swinging lantern in the far side of the flat which illuminated a small, neglected kitchen there.

As he crept past the sleeping form to the source of the music, he debated whether or not to steal the small stick he recognised as being what adults used to perform the Art. He was tempted to cal it _wand_- it was on the tip of his imaginary tongue- but he knew he'd never forgive himself for it.

The stick, which was a dark and grubby wood and longer than a foot, was grasped in the man's dirty fist and rested over his broad chest; it rose and fell as he snored.

Harry shook his head- there was too much risk of him waking up. Even if he did, and still held the stick, he remembered being able to defend himself at _seven_ against three of these people, before he'd even begun practising his skills. There was also the Colt Python that dug into the base of his spine near his belt. He'd be fine.

He saw the source of the rustic music- had he ever seen one before he'd have named it a Gramophone. As he hadn't, it resembled a retarded trumpet more than anything else, standing upon a dilapidated but full shelf of huge leather volumes.

_Well,_ Harry thought mildly, _his sound system is safe from being stolen._

Even though the man's coat was flung across the back of a chair near him, there was no sign of his own coat anywhere, Harry realised when he remembered why he was in there. He scanned the room, and saw many interesting things… but no jacket.

_Shit,_ he thought simply. _This might be harder than I anticipated. I'm going to need to take a look around._

He walked to the desk at the side of the room near the boarded up window and narrowed his eyes when he saw it. Instead of biros, a nice pen or two and normal leaflets and letters and scattered papers, it was covered in scrolls, quills, and rolls of wallpaper-thick eggshell parchment. An inkwell had recently upended over one of the curled documents. One of the few that weren't spattered with black ink proclaimed a very strange addressee…

_Mundungus Fletcher._

He shook his head, filtering through the sheets that littered it without actually reading anything. He opened a drawer and found clean parchment, another one to find inkwells and quills, and the final large one in the centre to find something that interested him greatly.

Two small leather bags which clinked when they moved.

Harry pocketed the money bags swiftly, muffling their contents inside his trousers. He dared another look at the sleeping form, but it hadn't moved.

Moving along the shelves briefly, he caught sight of a few very interesting titles, and even more things he couldn't even pronounce. Strange metallic objects that had rarely been used- for whatever purpose they had- decorated the tops of the shelves. Some of them looked to be broken.

He wandered past a chest with four consecutive locks on it, and after trying it and it stuck fast, prayed it wasn't in there. Laid across the top of it was one of the very few things Harry left the flat with later- a map of London north of the river. But not a normal map- it had marked upon it multiple secret passages and streets in London Harry had never even known existed.

He reached another desk, and found it to be much the same as the first one, and from the front of it he could turn to see what he hadn't noticed from the door of the flat- a low-burning open fire in a grate. He had to forcibly restrain himself from simply collapsing in front of it- he knew inside he was warm enough. His feet may hurt but he would continue to search all over this place til he found –

_What the…_

By his feet he'd seen something odder than everything else in here so far. He reached down stealthily and picked it up, spreading it out.

'The Daily Prophet' was printed across the top of it. It was evidently a periodical but nothing like Harry had ever seen. It was on that thick yellow paper again, in brown writing, with yesterday's date. It had the issue number and various other details at the top.

But Harry wasn't looking at the top.

He was staring, transfixed, at the black and white picture that took up most of the front page that was filled with a portly, pleasant looking little man with a smug grin on his face.

And the man was waving.

Harry blinked. _The man was waving._

He opened the page to see what was behind the paper to create such an optical illusion, and was surprised to find yet another picture on the third one. This one had more movement in it- a lot of people flying on broomsticks. _Actually flying on broomsticks._ They whizzed rapidly around the picture, and Harry turned again and again, witnessing page after page of these strange images.

He felt sick and dropped the paper onto the floor.

_What in the name of all that is holy…_

He found himself sitting in a chair, breathing deeply though still silently, and wishing he'd dropped the paper the other way up- that portly little man was still waving at him every so often as he gathered his bearings. He looked everywhere but at it.

_What the hell do I do now?_

He shook his head. _Don't get distracted, you fuckwit, find the damned jacket and lets get out of here,_ he told himself. He stood again, crouched low, eyes up, and continued on his search.

It was another twenty minutes of fruitless searching, stealthy movement and a silence broken only by the periodic loud breathing of the sleeping man before he saw it.

It was on the other side of the room, quite near the comatose figure, thrown haphazardly over a cabinet in the shady corner. Fighting the moving images from his own head, Harry swiftly made his way over, deciding to get his jacket secure before dealing with the man (he found he wasn't feeling quite as malicious towards him as he had been when he'd first seen him with the jacket, when his blood had run cold).

The place his jacket was in was quite odd, and a little disgusting, when compared to the rest of the room. There was a shrivelled, severed hand nearly touching it when he got close enough to see. There was one of those sticks they use, too, but it was broken and a shiny hair was poking out of the break. Actually on top of the jacket, weighing it down, was a perfect sphere of what looked like obsidian. Nearby sat a cheap looking ring with all the stones missing. Numerous other odds and ends decorated the dark corner- there was even a dagger dug into the wood of the cabinet a bit further down, and if it was not for its strange, ill look and faint glow he would have stolen it. However, he'd already decided that stealing anything from here would be immensely foolish.

The exception being his own jacket.

He put a reverent hand on it first, then nudged the obsidian ball off it, and pulled it towards him.

This, it turns out, was a mistake.

The jacket had been rested upon a foggy, smoke-grey mirror laid horizontally across the top of the cabinet. With a scratch over the wood and a crash to the floor, it split into a million pieces and flew across the carpet. Harry breathed "Shit," and spun around.

The man was on his feet, wide awake, the long polished stick of wood pointed right at him.

Harry stood there, jacket in his hands, and the moment seemed frozen in time… but all too soon things continued to happen.

The stranger had stared at him with wide eyes when he'd turned around, and Harry had assumed it was because of his age or size, or just general surprise at catching someone in his house in the act of burglary. Little did he know, the sole reason Mundungus Fletcher had not cursed him to within an inch of his life already was cut across his forehead.

His eyes stayed wide as he began to enunciate a spell. At the exact same moment, in the same shared heartbeat, Harry pulled his gun and levelled it.

Before anything else could occur, however, a sudden excruciating whine pierced the silence of the room, distracting and disrupting their efforts and forcing them both to their knees.

Harry cried out loud but found he couldn't hear himself- he looked up, expecting this to have been some strange trick of the enemy's, but found him in the same position. However, the man was not staring at Harry- he knew what it was, and was recovering, his eyes upon the door to the room.

The wards had just collapsed.

The door exploded open, the force of it lifting the man in the room- who'd been a few feet from the door- up and over the sofa he'd been sleeping on, flung to near the fireplace.

Harry found his gun in his hand and lifted it hesitantly.

Two men walked through the smoke before the dust settled. One of them was tall, powerfully built and black. He wore a suit. The other was just as tall but thinner, with pale blond hair past his shoulders and one of those _fucking_ sticks in his hand.

They didn't see Harry at first.

A voice from the other side of the sofa screamed "_Hedsufface!"_ and a monstrous green glow lit that side of the room, and Harry could hear flames, and the thin one with the stick raised it to shout something obscure. A jet of green light flashed from the end of it and followed Mundungus as he dived into the fire.

All green in the room left suddenly, and everything was briefly lit as it should be.

But the black man had seen Harry, and Harry had realised who it was.

"Shujin!" Sharif said in surprise, taking a step forwards.

_BANG_.

The blonde one span, jumping in fright at the crack and flash that filled the room, in time to get a face full of Sharif's shredded brain.

"Argh!" he screamed, spitting out debris, and then he wielded the stick wildly in Harry's direction and bellowed, "_Avada Kedavra!_"

The green light flew near him, but Harry easily dodged the wide shot. Still moving he aimed the Python at the flailing, shouting man and pulled the trigger again.

_BANG._

Another flare of light lit the room, and Harry's vision swam as he landed and hit his head.

The man screamed yet again, dropping his stick as he went down with a bullet in his arm. He was bellowing incoherently, but had enough sense to scramble behind the sofa out of view when Harry lined up for another shot.

Harry opened his mouth, still on his side, to shout at the man, but he'd not even taken in a full breath when a voice from somewhere behind him said, "_Expelliarmus!_" and the gun flew inexplicably from his hand to land on the other side of the room.

He span over, dodging another flash of light that splintered and spat up the wood where he'd laid half a second before, and recognised Sharif's chauffer from the glimpse he'd got of him before.

Beforehand he hadn't looked quite so angry though.

"Kill him!" the blonde man shouted from behind the sofa. Had he had the courage to look and see, he'd know it was not for lack of trying that Harry was still alive.

Harry was dodging and weaving over the whole floor, wincing whenever he landed on a piece of that broken mirror and knowing that he would not be able to keep on dodging for much longer. He became very quickly covered in blood- both his own, and Sharif's. All around him jets of light set the carpet on fire, blew floorboards to pieces and launched the shards of mirror into his skin.

If Harry was screaming he didn't realise it.

He took his chance when the chauffer ventured right up close to him, sticking the length of wood right towards him- he booted it across the room, right out of the man's hand.

The chauffer went after it and Harry rolled to his feet in the other direction, and through a stroke of luck the chauffer slipped on the entrails of his former boss that covered the floor, hindering his progress. As he reached for his stick, several things happened at once.

The fireplace roared and the blonde screamed again as a man stepped out- a man that wasn't Mundungus, but a tall, withered elderly man with an enormous beard. He and the blonde man had some vicious exchange, but Harry wasn't watching them- the other thing that happened at that precise moment was the slightly glowing dagger he'd seen earlier on the cabinet leaving his throw and thumping into the outstretched hand of the chauffer.

His arm exploded in a cloud of red and the man screamed. _Now I know what the knife does, _Harry thought.

The tall, white-haired wizard stood and began to shout obscure things into the room, and various things began to happen- for instance, the door slammed shut and the locked turned in it, the fireplace roared green again and another dark figure stepped out, and a lot of things Harry didn't' notice.

He didn't go for his gun. Harry stretched his arms out towards the newcomers, having finally had enough, and thought _TO HELL WITH THIS._

He called upon his Art.

The lights went out. Nothing produced light- the fireplace died, the lantern cracked and the flame blew out- and even spell fire directed into the room did not flash as it normally does… Sound was slightly muffled too. From the perspective of these newcomers, there would be a horrifically stifling darkness surrounding them, making them claustrophobic, cold and unnerved.

Harry could hear them all shouting things, and worked quickly, calling upon the pain in his whole body from the glass embedded there.

He made the room begin to get smaller, made things move around and the sharp debris start to whirl around the room as though there were high winds, and using his power he summoned his handgun to him.

He raised the heat with his left hand, pushing it upwards so that those in the room felt a baking, boiling warmth, and began to suck the air out. His eyes were rolled back in his head- he would not recall exactly what he used and how he did it, he simply flowed with it. He let his heart guide what happened. They'd scared and cornered Harry Potter- Shujin- and now they'd pay.

With his right hand he pumped the trigger on his weapon into the rest of the room until it was emptied. He put it back in the back of his waistband absent-mindedly. He felt an extraordinary rush of power, of his skills flowing and working through him- he could feel the power in his veins like concentrated adrenaline.

He held it for five more minutes.

He left things as they were- everyone had been affected, he could tell, because whereas at the beginning there had been shouts and screams and movement, now there was stillness and silence.

Harry had leant down and picked up his coat from the floor. Swinging it over his shoulders, he buttoned it slowly. His eyes were half-closed. He'd closed his eyes fully first, spread his arms in a stretch then pulled them into him, huddling into a smaller space.

Then he'd squeezed, and with a crack and flash of lighting, he'd disappear.

This extraordinary form of transport was only available to him when he'd used his Art excessively and really got his blood up. He didn't think about it, he just did it.

And that was how he found himself in the alley where he'd put his sword up the drainpipe. He removed it, shed it of its wet plastic cover and slid it sheath-first into the slit in the leather jacket he had reclaimed.

He'd sensed dawn approaching, his senses and awareness at their peaks, and had begun searching for a rooftop.

* * *

Snape opened his eyes 

His body ached from the small shards that peppered it and he had a dull ringing in his ears. He looked up at the ceiling of the moonlit room, wondering where in the name of Merlin he was.

He sat up and remembered.

Mundungus Fletcher had stumbled out of the fireplace of Professor Dumbledore's office, already dead, in a cloud of ash and soot. Dumbledore had gone straight there and Snape had warned the Faculty.

He'd followed as soon as he could, and stepped into chaos. Blood covered the walls and floor of Fletcher's flat, people had been screaming, bodies lay over the floor and Professor Dumbledore stood to the side of it all, wand arm outstretched, casting secure wards and shields… then the lights had gone out.

Snape had been trapped in his own personal hell. He was severely claustrophobic, and the darkness had pressed into him entirely. It was like being underwater in black ink. He'd shouted spells and obscenities, nothing had happened. He hadn't been conscious of dropping his wand. It felt as though the suffocating, hot blanket of black grew prickles, suddenly, and they cut and scratched his entire body. He'd hit the floor and panicked when, even with his nose a bare inch from it; he hadn't been able to see it. He'd screamed.

He saw the shards of mirror- or more accurately of Foe Glass- that covered the floor and glistened out of his robes and bare hands, saw where his wand had rolled to, and grabbed it.

He crawled to Professor Dumbledore's side, having no idea what had happened to the old man- the same as him, or worse? He put his hand carefully on the Headmaster's still arm, grasping the sleeve, but there was no reaction. His eyes widened as he caught sight of the bleeding wound in the side of his head.

"Sir?" he asked weakly. "Headmaster Dumbledore, sir-"

_There_. A stir; He lived.

Snape didn't look at the carnage around him- didn't bother to think yet about how the strange mage had bested Albus in a duel and managed to get out through his wards- he put his hand on his arm and summoned a book to him.

"_Portus,_" he croaked at it, and it shone faintly blue. He tried again and it worked better.

He closed his eyes, put his Headmaster's prone hand on it and then a finger of his own, and the final word rang into the newly found silence of the apocalyptic flat.

"Activate."

* * *

Harry wouldn't recall what made him choose this roof. It wasn't overly convenient… but maybe he was just tired of searching- bathed in a pink sunrise and beginning to ache from the night's exertion. 

He'd been wrong though, about having had enough of the strange mysteries of last night- one more thing had occurred before dawn had scourged the darkness from the land…

He'd received another letter from 'Hogwarts' via Owl.


	5. The Wall and Through

_Thank you everyone for your input and thoughts. Bellashade- good questions raised, and I apologise if I didn't get they 'why' through well enough for some people. Basically, Harry (although he'd never actually believe it- he's almost digusted by it) wants to belong somewhere. This is done slightly in JK Rowling's books, in that what he dreams of more than anything is to have a family. For this Harry it's different- he had the Dursleys, and he almost believes that it was the best a family could get. He is utterly content on his own. However, despite being content alone, he needs to feel as though he has an actual purpose. He needs to feel in place somewhere, because as much as he knows he can rely on himself, he just needs to try others relying on him so he knows he's made the right decision. Also, as explained further in this chapter, his reasons for going to Hogwarts are entirely selfish at first- he is a strong, solid and stubborn individual. As for the question about his drifter lifestyle- his not leaving London was supposed to mimic his sense of needing to feel in place somewhere. It has become, out of necessity, something familiar to him. My first draft of this story saw Harry in about 8 different cities up to his 16th birthday, and I had to part with that plotline, because it just did not fit with his profile. I'm not a psychologist but I'm doing my best with the complexity and complicity of human emotion- I hope it's readable at least!_

_And also; I'm afraid you'll all need to grow used to me introducing characters very quickly and then you never seeing them again- its a style I decided to experiment with in this story. Characters such as Murray, Nobunaga and Davey are prime examples- don't expect to see them again. They were there to further Harry as a person, or used as an example for me to show the sort of person he is. Rapid in-and-out characters will feature a lot I'm afraid- I'm still in the process of who I'd like to be main characters and who are expendable. I think I'm about to write an upset a few chapters on that is both original and entertaining- I can't remember if I warned you about Canon death or not? Ah well, consider yourselves warned _;)

_Thanks for reading, have a good one. See you next week, when I'll hopefully have time to start answering more reviews. GL._

* * *

"Aperio!"

The wall stayed a wall.

"_Shit!_" Harry swore.

He'd come quite far. He was following the secret passages noted down on that slip of paper he'd stolen from that man's flat a few days before, and had got through most of the pass-worded parts with the scrawled phrases on the map. For some reason though, this bloody wall wouldn't budge.

He wore his sword in his jacket and a thick woollen beanie hat on his head that covered his irregular scar. Some strange intuition had told him it might be a good idea.

He concentrated hard again, pointing his arms at the brick wall that stretched across the side of this basement room where it said to go on the map.

"OPEN!" He repeated. Yet again, nothing happened. "Damn this fucking thing!"

He was becoming more and more infuriated- nearly forty minutes he'd stood outside this bloody wall, marked down as the entrance to a tunnel on his map, shouting everything he could think of at it. It hadn't changed appearance in the slightest. He was beginning to doubt the accuracy of the old man's map.

A lesser man than him would, by now, have given up and gone back the way he came… but Harry Potter was a very determined young man.

He'd decided to imagine, for the sake of argument, that the letter from 'Hogwarts' wasn't a hoax. He knew that these psychopaths were real, in any case, having had it proved timelessly before him. He didn't like or trust the bastards, but if they had a school where they taught these things, even he saw the sense in looking into it. His Art was wild and unruly- he'd love to have the power that would come with controlling it.

And although he'd never admit it to himself, he desperately needed to _belong_.

_Besides,_ he'd reasoned with himself. _Even if I don't like the place, I'll just leave. It won't hurt to look at it._

He breathed through clenched teeth. He tried "Declaro!" which was a password from an earlier door, with no success.

He was following these strange, bewitched passages because he knew that the only place he'd be able to meet the bought equipment requirements for this school would be where these so called Magicians lived. Where they came to barter and trade. While he'd seen a few in his life amongst normal people, not everyone had access to such skills, and those that did seemed to hide pretty well a lot of the time.

So they had to have a hiding place.

Following the hand-drawn map of a streetwise wizard seemed like a fairly sensible way of finding them- especially when on this map it included roads he'd never seen before. He'd checked street maps of London- none of them were documented.

But first he had to get passed this wall.

"God-_damnit!_ OPEN! REVEAL YOURSELF! MOVE! PART! _APERIO! OBVIUM! DECLARO! REVELATIO! Shit!"_

He shouted at it. And shouted. And shouted.

Over and over, his blood boiling, he said password after password after swearword after password.

He tried a few of the more obscure ones written on the corners of the paper.

"_Ala – Al – Alohomora!"_ he waited, breathing heavily. "_Erumpo! Evanesco! Revera! ARGH - "_

In his fury, he whipped out his gun and aimed flailing at the wall.

_BANG._

The noise echoed around in the small space… but Harry had frozen, staring at the wall.

The bullet had in no possibility missed the huge expanse of brick. It hadn't gone anywhere else. Yet… there was no sign of it. No sign at all of a pockmark or hole or even chip in the red bricks.

"What the…"

It was tempting to use the gun again, but Harry had calmed now and bullets were precious in the UK, where firearms are strictly illegal. He holstered it inside his coat once more, and stepped towards the wall.

He could feel the hum of magic on it, as he had been able to for all of the gateways so far… but something was different about it. He'd avoided touching them all since the first one, which had given him an electric shock as his fingers had brushed it that had damn near reduced him to tears, though here he was beginning to realise what it was.

It wasn't a solid wall at all. It was an illusion. He pushed his hand forward, towards the brickwork, which looked solid enough. He tried to push on the cold, slightly wet-looking bricks… but his hand went straight through.

He stepped back, wiping his hand subconsciously, and held his breath. Then he plunged forwards.

He didn't physically feel a thing, though he knew the air had changed. He opened his eyes to see himself staring at the other side of a dim alleyway. There was the bullet hole in front of him, having gouged a chunk out of the brick as he'd known it would. He turned around and saw that the wall he'd just walked through looked exactly that from the other side too. He looked around, taking in the grey, dank and grimy area, and saw the only way out was a thin strip of light at one end of the alley. He could see people walking past it every so often, interrupting the beam of uneasy sunlight.

He pulled out the crumpled yellow map from his pocket, scratching his chin as he did so, and spread it in front of him. That _bloody _wall should be the last gateway in a while, he saw. He put it away and set off down towards the strip of civilisation.

Keeping his head low, he ducked into the ambling crowds of a crooked, dark alley with shop faces on either side leaning out over him. It appeared he'd hit a jackpot- everyone around him was dressed in a long robe of some sort, most of them black.

_Found you,_ Harry thought triumphantly. He shivered involuntarily as he watched the furtive, cloaked and anonymous figures walk back an forward down the narrow street- he hadn't seen a wand but he knew, almost like a 6th sense, that these people would be carrying them. He'd seen what the seemingly innocent sticks could do.

He began looking into the windows of the shops, ignoring the milling crowds and feeling quickly for his stolen two bags of money. He'd had quite the shock when he'd opened them- inside were not pounds, but both were filled with huge gold and silver coins. Also, to his surprise, the inside of the bags were at least four times the size of the outside. It was eerie to experiment with them, watching his hand disappear into a small purse to the elbow. Both were full to the brim with gold and silver.

They were in his pockets, safe.

He pulled out his Hogwarts letter quickly, scanned the equipment list, and decided that there was no time like the present. However, thinking sensibly, he decided to find some storage before anything else. A suitcase or sack would be ideal.

He walked into _MacReedy's Travel Accessories_ before anything else- as he pushed open the door a bell rang somewhere in the back and he pulled his jacket tighter and his woollen beanie down to his eyebrows as he felt the draft of the flat.

The shop was full to the brim with towering shelves of various strange, durable looking items. Long cloaks and robes, dusty with age, were on racks further in. Everywhere there were dark wooden boxes and leather trunks, and a sign hanging from the tarnished chandelier proclaimed 'Talk before Touch!'

Suddenly a man appeared- he was thin and straggly, with wisps of mousey-brown hair curling off his head every way conceivable. He had on enormously thick round glasses that made it seem like he was staring at you even when he wasn't.

His chin was held high as he said, "Welcome to the best travel accessory shop this side of the river. I'm Reuben MacReedy, and how can I be of – of …"

He'd suddenly seen who he was talking to.

After a long, almost comical pause, he asked, "Who are you? What do you want?"

"Some service..?"

"Service?" the man frowned, his enlarged eyes narrowing. "Where are your parents, boy?"

"I've got gold."

Another pause, this one shorter though.

"Alright. You can pay, then?" A weedy eyebrow arched upwards as he continued, "It's not cheap."

He eyed Harry's attire with disdain.

From the bag in his pocket Harry pulled a fist of a few coins. The man's eyes widened considerably through his glasses, and he stuttered slightly.

"W – well then. I'm – I apologise. We get a lot of riffraff. Not that I'm saying – oh, oh… never mind. Here, now, what would you like?" he said quickly. He considered, and then added, "Sir."

Harry pocketed the money again; thankful that it had been enough to sway the man- he had no idea of the exchange rate- he frowned himself.

"I'm doing some shopping," he said. "For school, probably; I need a bag or something."

"Oh – oh right away, my boy, why didn't you say so? Would you prefer a school issue trunk, or a rucksack for books? Are you attending Hogwarts?"

"I might be."

"I see. They tend to favour students arriving with a trunk of some sort. I wondered if you were considering Durmstrang… perhaps not."

He turned and wandered away into the shop. As he was pulling large boxes off shelves, he spoke over his shoulder, asking, "Do you have your robes for school yet?"

Harry eyed the dusty, moth-bitten racks at the back dubiously, but said, "No. I'm getting storage first."

"Ah," the man conceded. "Sensible."

There was a moment of silence broken only by the ruffling of MacReedy, then he spoke once more, to himself rather than to Harry.

"Aha, there we go. Good old catalogue," he said. Then, louder, "Not often I make a school sale anymore, though this is really the best place, of course." Harry could hear him grinning. "Still, I've got fair and decent prices on all my products, ask anyone nearby abou – oh, oh dear. I need to ask," He turned to him, dusty leather-bound book in hand, "What's your price range?"

Harry had no idea.

"Why don't you find something you think might be appropriate, and I'll see if I can afford it?"

"I – well – so be it, then. I'll go over standard issue models first- some of these are a bit old, but still, they -"

"I'd like some security on it."

The man focused his abnormal eyes on him, saying, "What type of security?"

"The secure kind. Do you do anything like that?"

The thin man spluttered indignantly, saying, "Well I never! Do we do – blimey, do we ever. Old Mad-eye Moody got his legendary trunk custom made from MacReedy, yes indeed sir. Course, that was a special circumstance, but still- I think we can manage some security for your trunk. Any other specifics?"

Harry didn't know who 'old mad eye' was, and didn't care, but at least he'd got his answer.

"Well- something easy to carry, I guess. I travel a lot. And something – you know, one of those things to make it bigger inside than out. Can that be done?"

The man eyed him again, surprised, saying in his irritating repetition, "Can it be done? Why, young master, _of course_ it can be done. The question is – the _real_ question – is Can it be _Paid_ for?"

Harry was beginning to tire of this man. He said nothing, just sighed.

The man caught it.

"I see. Well, I'll just – I'll just find some things that might interest you, yes sir? Right-o, you wait right there and I'll be back momentarily. I'll just – right, you wait there. One moment."

He disappeared into the shadows at the back. Harry looked at some of the strange assortments that strained the shelves- a hunting horn made of a huge, silver tusk; a pair of soft-leather boots that looked to be made from something suspiciously scaly; several pairs of strange, knobbly binoculars; coils and coils of different types of rope; even a set of small glass globes that Harry couldn't figure out. Further into the shop were amulets, stones with strange scratches on, and an absolutely _huge_ selection of rolled up maps and parchment travel guides that took up nearly a whole quarter of the shop.

Then MacReedy reappeared, and cleared his throat slightly as Harry was examining a strange egg.

"I think I may have something you'll like, young sir. If you'll follow me…"

Harry did so, but warily, uncomfortable being alone in this shop with this strange thin man. Hey walked past the racks of old robes and behind a crooked wooden counter, appearing in a workroom. On the desk in the middle of the room was a sleek, black-leather trunk nearly as long as Harry was tall. It had four locks latching up the front.

"This looks good," Harry said.

"Ah, I'm glad it meets with your approval," the man said. Harry cursed his stupidity- showing interest was a sure way to raise its price. The man went on, "It's almost fully spell resistant, or at least, will be when it leaves the shop. A couple of things must be done to it before it has its final wards put on. Each lock," he indicated, "unlocked in certain combinations opens a different compartment. Some are passworded, some need a key, and some recognise a certain type of wand. They can be set once you've made the purchase."

Harry frowned, saying, "Hold on- what was that about compartments? There's only one lid."

The man looked at him strangely and, without speaking, tapped his wand on the first lock of the four. Then he hit the third and fourth, but the last one he unlocked was the second one along. He lifted the top of the trunk, Harry smelling the fresh hide, and gestured inside. Harry stepped forwards, having stopped himself reacting badly to the proximity of an adult with a … _wand_.

Inside was a space about double the volume of the outside, and Harry smiled in a satisfied way. _This would do nicely,_ he thought. Red velvet lined the inside.

The man leant over and placed a chunk of wood into it. Harry had no idea why, at first, then the man closed the lid again. All the locks snapped shut.

He tapped the locks again, but this time in the order One, Two, Three and Four in a row.

Pushing the lid up again, Harry peered inside, and forcibly stopped himself doing a double take. This compartment was a lot smaller- in fact, it was the actual size of the trunk on the outside- and was lined with purple velvet. The chunk of wood was missing.

"It's good to memorise combinations," the man was saying. "So you can access things quickly. For instance, stuff you won't need which can be stored away can go in the bigger compartments, in which you'll need to root around or occasionally actually get into. There's enough room for someone of your size to sleep in, no doubt, should you ever need to. Things you'll need urgently, in a rush, put in the simplest combination- this one- which is also the smallest compartment, so you can just reach in and pluck it out. It's extremely useful."

_I'll bet,_ Harry thought. He watched the man tap in the first combination and retrieve the chunk of wood. He was very pleased, suddenly, with the idea of learning magic.

"Alright. Before I buy this, I'll need some more things, I think."

"Excellent- we may agree on a price at the end of your browsing, is that alright? Yes? Excellent, I'll just start a list."

He bent over the worktable and scrawled, with a quill, a meticulously written title- 'Receipt'- and 'Four-lock Trunk' underneath. He didn't write a price.

"Ok then, you'll be needing some robes, hmm?"

Harry did not want to refuse point blank, deciding the price would be high enough as it was, so allowed himself to be led to the racks. Once again he was surprised.

MacReedy bent down to the base of the rack and lifted a sheet out of nowhere- with it went the image of robes with holes and covered in dust. Instead, from underneath shone a pristinely kept array of wizard-wear of various gorgeous materials that Harry itched to run his hands over. Blues, Greens and Purples shone out as well as black, whereas with that strange sheet on before they'd all looked grey and decrepit.

"Used to deter thieves," MacReedy explained. "I'll sort you out some nice school robes. I suppose you might be a bit young for dress-robes… shame. You'll have to come back when you need them in a few years; for your graduation at least."

Harry vaguely nodded, not taking it in, looking at some of the strange, draping clothes. He'd never owned anything that looked so nice. He suddenly felt a lot warmer to the idea of wearing robes, and then caught himself. _I'd look as ridiculous as the rest of these idiots,_ he thought glumly. _But then, _he conceded, _if everyone else is wearing them I won't feel quite as ridiculous._

Before long MacReedy was adding to the list- he'd given Harry a set of school uniform and robes for Hogwarts that looked brand new, and apparently would preserve themselves and grow to fit Harry when he wore them for at least a three-year guarantee.

Harry, flushed with a legitimate shopping-high, then asked for a travelling robe.

MacReedy here looked even more pleased. He eyed Harry's sword, which he'd forgotten he was wearing, and told him, "Yes- I'll find you a good cloak that'll conceal that… _item…_ a bit better than that, if you like. Yes."

He pointed his wand at a small travelling cloak; the one Harry had pointed out, and said, "_Condecomfus!"_

"Alright," he continued as he took it off the hanger. "Put that sword by your side and try this on. It should work well enough – ah yes, perfect. You can't tell the difference."

Harry looked in a tarnished old mirror at his reflection and was astonished. He was holding the sheathed blade by his hip, and could feel it there, inside his robe, but somehow from the outside it looked as though he merely had his arms by his side.

"That's the space-enlarger. Common, but hard to perform. It'll last you as long as that cloak is in good condition and if it ever needs repairs, come and see me."

Harry ended up buying a belt with a sash to wear his sword around his belt when he wore the cloak. He bought the soft boots from the shelf too- apparently they helped keep your feet silent. They would be _very_ useful. What also went into the trunk were a few odds and ends from the shop- a _real _map of wizarding London, for instance, and a few books that caught his eye.

When it was certain he'd buy his accumulation, the merchant offered to emboss his initials into it. A gold **H.P** was now emblazoned across the front at the top. Harry loved it.

The end price came to one hundred and sixteen galleons.

"Eighty-one for the trunk alone," the man told him mournfully. He obviously didn't think he'd get the money. He was part right.

"You can have one-hundred now, cash-in-hand, Mr. MacReedy."

"One hundred!? Criminal!" he exclaimed. "I'll do myself out of business!"

"No offence, Mr. MacReedy, but you don't have any business as it is. I've been your only customer all morning." The man blushed. "People are more likely to come to you if they hear from a customer how good your prices are."

"Why, you manipulative… you – argh." He rubbed his eyes behind his huge glasses. "Look, boy, I can't give that much away for one hundred. One sixteen is a fair price."

"One hundred and ten, Mr. MacReedy, if I leave one of the books, and you give me directions to the nearest wand shop."

The man narrowed his eyes at him, thinking furiously. Harry began to pray he had one hundred and ten 'galleons'. He didn't even know what the coins were called.

MacReedy, being the sensible businessman he was, conceded. "Fine," he told Harry, "So be it. I'll have back that book on herbs-"

Harry didn't argue- he'd picked up two on common magical Herbs, and he gave back the cheaper one. As the man wrote down directions to the wand-crafters, Harry began laying out the contents of his money bags on the counter… he pretended to be counting them out when he was actually trying to figure out what in the hell each one was.

He saw it written in the inscription around the edge of the big gold ones- something 'galleon'- so guessed these must be the ones. He was certain, as he counted them out, that he must be handing over nearly a thousand pounds for this bloody man.

"There, a hundred and ten… my directions?"

The man handed them over- it was a simple map to a couple of roads away.

"Thank you," Harry said. "I hope to see you again."

The man was counting his profit as Harry wheeled the trunk towards the door. When he shouted out, Harry turned quickly, not to be accused of trying to swindle the bastard.

But instead, he held his wand loosely in his hand. Harry fondled his gun gently, wary. The money was already nowhere to be seen.

"Er – I was supposed to do one more thing to the trunk." Before Harry could argue, he waved his wand half-heartedly, whispering something in Latin. "There," he said, "Now say 'Away!' for it to shrink to a manageable size, and 'Home' for it to go back to normal." He managed a pained smile at Harry. "Have a nice day."

* * *

He'd been directed out of that alley and into another even darker one that opened into a square called Knockholt. With his sword in his trunk he drew fewer stares this time. The trunk was the size of a matchbox in his pocket, and he was almost giddy with smugness. _Why did I let myself be ignorant to all this for so long?_

From Knockholt Square he went into Knockturn Alley, which was a little shadier, and was plagued with beggars. He ignored them studiously as he walked down the row, then emerged onto what he'd find out was Diagon Alley. He blinked in surprise.

This almost glowed yellow- it was buzzing with colourful activity, humming with sound and swelling with moving people. More, taller shops graced each side of the street. He shook his head and looked at his map and followed this along to the shop- _Ollivander's_.

A bell rang again as he entered. This time, there was another set of customers in the shop before him, and he sat on a spindly chair to wait his turn.

Being served by the ghost-like old shopkeeper was a dumpy little boy who looked younger than Harry, and kept giving him nervous, shifty looks. The old woman who accompanied him and was basically choosing his wand for him glared openly at Harry, who merely sat there, indifferent.

Eventually, the matriarch lost her temper, and said to the shopkeeper that he could keep his stupid wands, and as she marched the boy out (with one last glare at Harry) she told him he'd have to use his father's old wand, if he hadn't lost it.

Harry smiled slightly and stood, making his way to the elderly merchant, who was looking painfully at the mess of wands that scattered across his desk.

"What can I do for you then, young sir? First wand?" he said.

Harry nodded, meeting his eyes, saying, "Yes, please."

But the shopkeeper had just tuned out. Staring into Harry's eyes, his face dropped, and he gasped slightly.

"Oh my," he said, his eyes flicking to Harry's covered forehead, almost as though he knew the scar was there. "Oh my," he said again. "How strangely fortunate that I should be seeing you here, Mr. Potter…"

Harry's mouth was open slightly in surprise.

"How – er, do we know each other?"

"I suspect," the man said solemnly, "We'll both know more about you soon enough." Harry blinked in confusion. "However," the man went on, "You're here for a wand."

He began to measure Harry with a phantom tape, but Harry was only paying half-attention, thinking of what had been said. It had unnerved him thoroughly- so used to being unknown, to be recognised by a total stranger had shaken him thoroughly.

He was asked to try every wand laid out already, giving each one a wave and having it snatched from his hands by the merchant, who looked a lot less grave and mysterious now he was getting absorbed in his work. Then the merchant wondered into the shadows of the shop, and brought back armfuls of different types of wand.

Harry, personally, had never known how many goddamned pieces of wood could be _different_ to each other. He almost stopped caring about having a wand, if it was this much trouble to procure one.

Finally, the shopkeeper brought just one box over very reluctantly. He eyed Harry nervously, mumbling to himself, and Harry forced patience.

"I wonder," the man kept repeating to himself.

As Harry took this wand, which looked the same as _every bloody other one,_ he suddenly got the strangest, most wonderful sensation. He understood in a heartbeat why finding the right one mattered so much.

"Oh," he breathed, seeing gold.

"Oh indeed, Harry," the old man said, sounding resigned. "Curious, certainly… I suppose I should have guessed… do you know anything of your past, young Harry?"

He shook his head, still enjoying the strange, nice feeling of the wand. He was almost delirious.

"Then I am not the one to tell you it. But you've found your wand, Mr. Potter. Phoenix feather- Holly- A nice one… an old one…"

"How much?" Harry asked out loud, returning to Earth.

"Eight galleons and two sickles, Mr. Potter. May it serve you well."

The bell rang again as he stepped outside, still holding his wand.

* * *

Harry found himself looking for a roof to spend the night on as the evening approached… then stopped himself. 

Despite preferring it outside in the fresh air, what was the point? Tonight was the first night in a damned long time that he actually had the means to rent a room. Even though he's been shopping all day- one of his larger compartments had become something of a library, as Harry had forgotten how much he loved reading, and he'd also bought food and then 'potions' equipment as dictated on his supplies letter- he still had more than enough to spend the night in the room of an inn.

This was something he did rarely, and he hadn't even emptied _one_ of the enlarged bags of gold and silver through the day, so he couldn't find a valid reason not to.

He went from one end of the emptying Alley to the other, and decided to go to the Swinging Lantern Inn which was a few roads from Diagon Alley in _Trest Pass_. It looked pleasant enough. He got a pitcher of 'butter beer', which he knew would probably fuck up his stomach with richness, and some bread and soup.

He rented a room- eleven sickles a night- with no problem, and went up to it, enlarging his new trunk and placing it at the foot of his bed. He opened the compartment with the green velvet- about four times the size of the trunk on the inside- and picked out four books. They were _Standard Book of Spells, Volume I_, which was set reading and looked horribly boring, _Compendium of Runic Magic_ and _Who's Who in the Wizarding World, _both of which he'd got from Flourish & Blott's and finally _Dark Warlocks through the Ages_ which he'd haggled off a woman in Knockturn Alley.

He settled down on the bed, lit up a cigarette and drank his soup and thinking how real, bought food tasted so much more nourishing than conjured, began to memorise everything in Goshawk's _Standard Book of Spells_. Occasionally, he'd point his new, beautiful wand at the air in front of him and try one, but with little success.

Feeling his eyes droop after he'd finished just two chapters, he let himself fall.

* * *

He woke up at dawn, his neck stiff from the pillow, and threw on his leather jacket. He stretched as he did it, clicking his joints and yawning. Rubbing his eyes and putting his beanie on, he went into the series of Alleys again, deciding that he could leave this things in the room for once, seeing as he had it til midday. 

It was as he sat down at a table outside Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream parlour with a glass of water and a cigarette drawing some strange stares from passersby, _Beginner's Sport Duelling _by Darren King open on the table, that he decided he'd stay there for the week, right up til September 1st, which he was growing very excited- and apprehensive- about. Why he made this decision he couldn't say- he just found that, in a society of people with the Art, where he didn't feel quite so peculiarly alone, he was strangely comfortable.

He couldn't object to anything about the place. The people wandering past in their strange clothes he'd presumably have to get used to anyway, and they were all so innocent. He wondered how many of them had ever tried drugs, or slept a single night of their plush lives on the streets of non-magical London. The answer, he knew, was none of them.

He couldn't explain it- it was simply cute. Endearing, kind of. They were a world away from what he was used to… here he wasn't street-Harry, or Shujin. He carried his gun with him, but knew he wouldn't need it. It wasn't that he felt secure- he was still as suspicious as ever- he simply felt… a part of it.

He was a normal, magical 11 year old, kind of. A normal, magical 11 year old… with a gun… and a cigarette…

He laughed to himself, drawing more stares, and buried himself in his book.


	6. The Definition of I

_G'day again, and thanks once more for taking the time to write the reviews. I'm glad people are enjoying my story- that's what makes the lizard grin _

_When I first posted a chapter up I had already written up to this point. At present I'm on chapter 14. I hadn't planned to seperate the parts of story into seperate Volumes or books but it happened anyway, I'm not sure if I'll be able to represent that on here, but in case your wondering whether after Chapter 9 the story is suddenly different in a number of ways (without spoiling it) that'll be why._

_I'm also physically striving to keep this plot swerved well around the cliché moments that feature in similar stories. If I slip I'm sorry, I'm trying to root through it and make things more readable, believeable and original- I'll be damned but it's harder than you'd think. I hopefully achieved that while still allowing Harry some leeway in this chapter- you'll see what I mean. If at the end you're feeling a bit put out that something you expected to happen actually happens, albeit in a slightly different way, never fear! Things aren't going to simply be going easy and fine for Harry from now on... where would be the fun in that?_

_The next chapter will be better, you have my word. The shit in this simply _needed _to happen. Enjoy and have a nice week- GL._

* * *

Before September 1st came around he made a number of new, legitimate purchases- mainly they were books, but the two most noticeable were a leather arm-strap for his new wand, and an ornamental dagger with an engraved green hilt. 

He loved his new dagger. Despite the convenience of his black wand-holster, which remained with a wand in strapped to his arm at all times, he had never before owned a proper dagger. Occasionally he'd used a knife, but never one so beautiful that was really, honestly his own.

When he chose his cloak over his jacket, he could wear it in its sheath next to his gun at the back of his belt, but he didn't take both the dagger _and_ the gun out when he chose his coat.

Gradually, almost unwillingly, he was relaxing.

Also, the more he practised some of the things in the books he found, the easier they became. He found that when he used his hands to perform his Art he'd get a lot more power, with or without saying the 'incantations', but when he used his wand he achieved more precise and accurate results.

Why anyone in the world, Wizard or otherwise, would ever need or want to transfigure a rat into a teacup, however, was beyond him.

At present he was sitting in his room, the one he'd been in for a few nights now, reading and absorbing information with _Who's Who in the Wizarding World?_ By M. M. Hodge open in his lap, sipping conjured cola and smoking his second-to-last cigarette lazily.

It had amused him to no ends to find his own name under 'P'. Find it he had, when he had first been breezing through, because it turned out that these lunatics thought him some kind of infant hero. He was certain the name- which wasn't all that uncommon- must have simply been a coincidence… until he'd seen the dates.

After reading about Gulliver Pokeby and Petrova Porskoff, he got to his own name again.

_Harry Potter,_ it read. He grimaced and kept reading. _Key to the downfall of the Dark Sorcerer He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named on Halloween, 1981, despite being only a year old. The exact events surrounding the joyous occasion are uncertain but valid sources dictate that he lived through what should have been a fatal attack by the most dangerous wizard of the generation, whereas the Dark Wizard did not. The details of the night are hazy and closely-guarded, but reportedly young Harry Potter achieved the impossible and survived the Killing Curse, the first ever recorded to have done so, and the caster did not as the spell rebounded unto him. Harry's parents Lily and James Potter, both working for the government, did not survive the attack. Eye-witnesses claimed that the baby Potter had nothing but a lightning-bolt scar to show for it as he was pulled from the wreckage of his home, and at present, nobody knows where the boy is. His whereabouts have been hidden from the general public, presumably by the government, at first to stop the remnants of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's forces from finding him. However, the lack of evidence and appearance by young Harry has led sceptics to believe that maybe he did not survive the night after all, but died later, over time. Others ventured publicly that perhaps, in surviving the un-survivable curse, his magic was removed from him by the spell and he has grown up in the muggle world as a squib. Wherever he is, alive or dead, there is no doubt that whatever happened, the baby Harry Potter in 1981 put an end to nearly 2 decades of terror at the hands of a Dark Wizard people still fear to say the name of. The question is, did Harry become a Hero… or a Martyr..?_

Harry snorted again, but closed the book and ran his hands through his short hair.

_So I'm a Hero,_ Harry thought glumly. _For something I have no memory of that happened 10 years ago. Because… what? I should have died but didn't?_

He'd love more than anything to believe that it wasn't him, but the dates matched in an uncanny way. And the _scar_, he knew as he rubbed his forehead.

What was it his Aunt had told him? He tried to remember- ah yes, that he'd got it in a car crash. The same accident that killed his parents. He snorted- _It's as unremarkable as you are,_ she'd said to him.

So how had he ended up in their cruel hands? They were likely his last surviving relatives, but did the non-magical government have so much sway over the magical that it would have made a difference? His Aunt and Uncle, there was no doubt on the face of the earth, were _not_ magical. However, apparently, his parents or at least his Dad had been.

_And why me?_ He wondered hopelessly. _Why am I this little saviour- if it even fucking happened? Why not some wizard kid?_

He was having serious doubts about joining- or _re_joining- this world. What sort of reaction would he get from these people? Would they hail him as a saviour- would they even believe it's him? It sounded like there were a lot of sceptics as to whether he even existed, and the selfish side of Harry felt rather warm to the idea of leaving them guessing.

_See how these people, who abandoned or simply _lost_ me, like it when I don't respond to their little summons; when I don't go to this freak school on time._

He spat on the floor, then admonished himself silently and waved his hand, wordlessly vanishing the phloem on the wood.

The selfish side of Harry would love that, but then, he knew, it wasn't the 'let's help others' side of him that wanted to go. It was a side just as selfish. He wanted to go for his own reasons- to learn to control his art and to get better and more powerful. He had every intention of surviving on his own, as he always had. He wasn't going to help anyone, and sure as hell not to spread hope that their little 'saviour' had returned to them.

_They've never done a damn thing for me- it took a one-year-old child to destroy this guy… what the hell were the rest of them doing? And where have they been? Why haven't I met one who knew my name who didn't try to kill me?_

But then he remembered that night when he was seven, before he'd run away. The two old men in his house had sounded like wizards- like they knew about and were using this queer magic thing. He couldn't remember what they'd been saying- he'd been paralysed with fear that they'd find him and kill him- but they'd definitely sounded like it. And they'd mentioned the thing that had happened at the dentist's surgery.

_So why did they wait until I was out of the house?_ He thought. _Unless they didn't think I was magical, like that book says, and didn't want to chance it._

As he thought more about it, he realised that the two had thought that the strange witch-woman who had been in there with him had killed the three of them. They'd mentioned her name but he couldn't recall it.

_They must not have thought I could do magic… _he realised, and the thought made him more angry than ever. _So I'm their little saviour and those bastards were going to let me live out my life unaware of this world? Under the boot of my Uncle, not being able to do any magic, not being able to heal myself, nothing at all? Just let me go to a shitty school, then an even worse secondary school, get a crap job in the non-magic world and live like someone who was totally ignorant of all this?_

So furious he was now that he rose from his chair, dumped the book in the bin near the desk and hurled the metal cup he'd been drinking from at the far wall. As the resulting splash and clatter he felt even worse.

He paused, breathing heavily in indignation, feeling unshed tears sting his eyelids. Angrily he wiped his eyes but fortunately they stayed dry.

He stood there for a long time, eyes closed, thinking to himself and trying to steady his breathing as his sensei had taught him. This gave him the idea to get out his sword and practise some forms, to take his mind of everything.

He stepped to his trunk and tapped the locks in the memorised order with the end of the wand, which jumped into his hand from the arm-strap with a wordless command, and pushed back the lid.

Pulling out his beautiful Katana and unsheathing it, he retreated into himself, breathing slowly and moving from one _Kata_ to the next, again and again in the centre of the room.

Up – down – side – bend – swipe – hold – swing – up – side – thrust – hold – swipe – left foot forward – blade down and swinging around – turning with it – blade left – up – right – bend legs – switch hands – swing – step back – hold – grasp in both hands – down straight, _fast_, and hold. Breathe.

Repeat.

Ten minutes later, he'd made his decision.

He picked up his black cloak and pulled the hood up, and by the time the door to his room swung shut behind him it was out of sight down the corridor.

* * *

"What was that?" 

"I asked, sir, if I could view any public records of my family."

The man sighed in a long-suffering manner and shook his head, not even looking at Harry.

"We don't hold those _here_, kid."

"Where might I find them?"

"Well," the man said, looking at him finally, "You'll need your _parents_ to owl the ministry to organise sending out the papers. No doubt _they've_ got records of your family. Somewhere. But if your family isn't keeping their own trees and details, it's unlikely there's anything _worth_ seeing."

Harry clenched his teeth, and said, "Right."

He span on his feet and marched to the front of the store, trying to reign in his anger. There was no use going into it with this stuck-up idiot, he'd have to try somewhere else.

"Or Gringotts," the voice said behind him in a bored way.

Reluctantly, Harry turned, asking, "Sorry?"

"_The Bank_," the man said, shaking his head. "You were looking for financial history?"

"Anything I can get my hands on."

"Right," the man said with a nod. He added, "Well, try the _bank_ then, hmm?"

Harry didn't thank him, he just continued out.

When in the street again, looking at the overcast skies out of his hood, he walked back towards the entrance to Diagon Alley. He knew where the bank was- he'd never had reason to go in there before, as it hadn't occurred to him that maybe his family had an account there with anything left in it.

_No doubt,_ he thought, _everything there went to my darling Aunt and Uncle. Along with me. Not that I ever saw a shred of it._

He kept his eyes down mostly, despite his bad mood, understanding the need to not draw attention to himself in the middle of the public road in a place he was supposed to be some ridiculous celebrity.

But the place that held records of him, he knew, would likely be a place he could sort out his real reason for finding them.

He saw the huge grey building about a full minute before he reached it- despite the grey August 29th the place was still packed. _An entire secret community in a single place in London? _He mused. _That can't be right- must be others. Maybe this is the most popular._

He went into the front doors of the bank just as it began to rain, and praised his timing. He pushed without regarding the guard and the inscription of the door, in his own thoughts.

Joining a queue- the shortest- he tried to think of what he'd say to the teller. Running over it in his head, the line got shorter as those in front of him were either led further into the bank, or left, their business complete.

When he reached the front he paused for a few seconds, mouth hanging slightly open as the thoughts left his head while he gazed at the thing in front of him.

The creature behind the desk, recognising this, curled a lip in distaste and displayed its sharp teeth.

"_Shit,"_ Harry swore under his breath, before speaking up with, "Erm – Hi – I was wondering… sir… if I could possible see – er… well, if I could meet with an employee to discuss… family. Family stuff."

The thing stared at him, eyes narrowed, for what seemed like a hugely long time. Harry tried to maintain eye contact and not look at the beast's teeth or ears.

"Hornrot!" it suddenly shouted, making Harry jump, to his own shame.

A small, wizened little thing shuffled up, gazing up at the thing behind the desk. _Holy fuck,_ Harry thought, his mind all but blank. _There are hundreds of them._

Looking around the floor of the bank he saw that every single teller was one of these creatures, as were all the little figures running back and forth at work. So absorbed in his own thoughts, he hadn't even realised.

"Show this," the teller was saying, "_Person_ to a free consultation chamber."

The little one- Hornrot?- nodded at the first and turned. Harry dumbly followed.

Through multiple corridors that looked exactly the same he was led, on and on, only a few doors ever on either side of a corridor. Flaming torches lit the place, in brackets on the walls, and in the light Harry could see jagged carvings covering the spaces from floor to ceiling. Occasionally there were concentrations of carvings around a particular space, which Harry guessed must be doors or something.

As he was led into the heart of the bank by this thing he abruptly blurted, "What are you?"

To his surprise the thing, its back still turned, let out what could have been anything between a throaty chuckle and a growl, without saying a thing.

Harry was ashamed of his own stupidity, reminding himself that he was in a strange world and that he should expect anything unexpected. He kept silent until he was directed finally to a stone door, made of something different than the rest of the walls.

"Thank you," he said, but as he turned from the ornate door the little thing had already scurried off.

Shaking his head, Harry turned and pushed open the door.

The room wasn't empty.

* * *

Albus polished his glasses on the end of his beard, a tactic he often used to spare a moment to organise his thoughts. 

He could sense, almost hear, Minerva's impatience, though she of course didn't move a muscle. The other occupant of the room remained silent. His forehead creased slightly in consideration, and then apparently satisfied he placed the spectacles once more on the end of his long nose.

"Please, Jacob," he said slowly. "Tell us again what you found."

The man across the Headmaster's Desk shrugged slightly, nonchalant, and examined his fingernails.

"S'more what I didn't find, Professor," he said quietly. "Nothin' there, you see."

"For goodness' sake," Minerva suddenly burst out, "Can you not just tell us what you know?"

Albus' eyes didn't leave the man, who hadn't flinched from the Professor's reaction.

Jacob sighed, and shrugged again, saying, "Nothing more to tell, Professors. According to my files, he received the letter. No reply. Nothing."

"But he actually got the letter? He's read it?"

"Well, someone has."

There was a moment of silence.

"Thank you, Jacob," the Headmaster said at last. "You've been very enlightening. You may go."

The man grinned sourly, but merely nodded at the Headmaster as he left. The Transfiguration teacher was ignored.

When the oak door to the office closed, Minerva tutted very loudly.

"Enlightening, _indeed._"

Albus smiled absent-mindedly, absorbed in his thoughts.

"Albus," Minerva said, "What do you suppose was meant by '_Someone_ has'?"

The more-elderly of the two looked up, no longer smiling, and said, "All that the records will show, Minerva, is that the letter was opened and extracted."

"Not by the boy himself?"

The Head sighed, and said, "Apparently not."

"_Honestly._ What sort of ridiculous system are we running on- why have we never had this problem before?"

"Because… well, Minerva, I suppose because Harry Potter is far from ordinary."

"We shall have to check the address of the letter, then- to make sure the boy received it."

"Indeed," Albus said, eyes closed again. "A task which would be a lot easier if anyone could tell us the address. Unfortunately, they can't."

"What on earth- why not, Albus?"

"Harry… he's different to other children in the way that he can't be located. I saw to that, years ago."

"But then – how did the Owls find him? Don't tell me the ministry can find the boy and we can't!"

"Post-owls," Albus said, half-smiling again, "Don't use magic to locate a person. They use their natural instinct and ability. You send the letters to the ministry, they send them to the children, we trust in them to show up on September 1st."

"But – but he'll still be with the Dursleys then, surely?"

"I sincerely hope so, Minerva," Albus said. "I can't envision a reason for him to have left them- not with the measures we took."

"I shall go myself then- I scouted the house of that abysmal family all those years ago, I know where to find him."

The old man looked up into her stern face, hardened with determination, and considered.

_She obviously cares for the boy,_ he thought. _Or imagines she'll come to. But how will he react to her abrasive revelation to him… and to meet a teacher before anyone else… maybe it wouldn't be the correct first impression. But how to put this?_

"I appreciate the offer, Minerva, my dear," he said at last with a kindly smile. "But you are needed at the school. I will send… Hagrid, most likely. You dislike the family evidently, and one of his schoolteachers might not be the best person to persuade young Harry to come. With hope, he and Hagrid may befriend one another."

"Why am I needed at the school, Albus?" she demanded. "Term doesn't start until 2 days from now."

"Which is exactly why I need you here to organise the castle. As the deputy headmistress that's your position, and I wouldn't entrust that to anyone else. I will be needed away from here, at the Ministry, until the start of term."

Minerva McGonagall was standing, debating through the logic of this, clearly desperate to ask why Albus wouldn't be present until the start of term but mindful of overstepping her bounds. Albus already had a number of reasons lined up and was wondering if he would use them if she asked.

Albus counted to ten in his head.

"Thank you, Minerva, but I'll be needing to leave soon."

"Why Hagrid, Professor Dumbledore, if you don't mind my asking?"

He surveyed her over his glasses.

"Hagrid managed to help Harry reach his family all those years gone. I trust him to bring him back from them. Besides," he added when she didn't move, "Harry most likely does _not_ know he is a wizard. The letter may have shocked him into ignoring it as a hoax. His introduction to the magical world would be better received by someone like Hagrid, who is not allowed to perform magic himself- one objective observer to another, if you will."

He was pleased with how he'd thought that out as he'd said it- it actually did make sense. He picked up a quill and dipped it in an inkpot, on the pretence of a dismissal.

"Of course, Albus," the Transfiguration teacher said. "Shall I send up Hagrid?"

The Head considered.

"No, thank you, Minerva," he smiled at her. "I shall pay a visit to him in his hut this afternoon."

She left.

Albus Dumbledore put down his quill, unused, and pressed his forehead against his steepled fingers, deep in thought.

* * *

"Do you _mind?_" the woman said irritably. 

Harry looked at her and her young companion, who shared her bright blonde shade of hair, and then at the small goblin on the opposite side of the broad stone desk.

"Sorry," he said at last. "I'll wait outside."

"No, young sir," the gruff voice of the little monster stopped him. "Our business was just finishing."

Harry turned back to them and saw the peevish woman- old but attractive, like some trophy wife- was looking now at the goblin, a sneer on her lips.

"Sign this, please," the green beast instructed her, pushing a sheaf of parchment with block calligraphy covering it towards her over the desk.

As she did so, Harry watched the little creature as it watched her. It was of course a goblin, he now realised. He'd read about them in one of his books. Had he been thinking clearly he'd have expected the vicious little creatures to run this place.

"Right," the woman said with a humph. "Come, Draco."

The Goblin stood, though it made very little difference to its height, and bowed to the two of them, saying, "Good day, Lady Malfoy, Master Malfoy."

They walked towards the door, ignoring the thing, and Harry stepped aside. The woman didn't glance at him but the boy, who must have been about his own age, caught sight of him under the hood and they met stares. Then the eyes snapped up to his forehead. He let out a huge gasp.

"Wha – Mum! _Mum_!" he hissed, having stopped suddenly.

Harry wasn't having it. He turned his hooded head away and strode past him towards the desk.

"Mum- he-"

"Come _along,_ Draco!"

Sounds met Harry's ears of the boy being pulled out suddenly and the stone door shutting, surprisingly soft. He sat in a stone chair.

"Hi," he said to the goblin, now deciding to make a better impression on them. "I was wondering-"

"Name?" the thing asked abruptly.

"Err – Potter. Harry Potter."

Their eyes met briefly as he pulled his hood down, then the goblin looked down at his paper again.

"Service required?"

"I'd like access to my family's history, please."

"For what purpose?"

"I'd – I'd like to legally change my name."

Their eyes met again, for longer.

"I see," it eventually said.

"Can it be done?"

"No."

_Shit._

"Why not?"

"A name can be changed, but in your case Mr. Harry Potter, it could only be your first name."

"That's good enough. I'll just change that."

"If you'll please let me _finish_," the thing said shortly. Harry bit his tongue, angry again. It continued, "It could only be your first name, but even that procedure would take months through the courts of _your_ species. That's even if you have a valid reason. _Assuming,_" he continued when Harry opened his mouth, "That you do have a valid reason; your government is unlikely to let you change your name, Mr. Harry Potter."

"Ok. Why?"

"Because of your reputation alone. That, and the fact you are underage."

"Shit," Harry muttered.

"Indeed," the goblin said.

"But – but when I'm old enough, I'll be able to?"

"That is unlikely. The Wizard's world loves its _Heroes_."

"Well, I don't want to be a – a known name."

"I appreciate that," it said, though Harry doubted it.

"Why can a wizard only change their first name?"

The thing sighed, a kind of gargle, and said, "Again you make the mistake of including yourself among the rest of the populous. Most wizards and witches can change their whole name, but some of the older families' only heirs are _strongly advised_ against removing their family name, as it would null most claims to inheritance."

Harry looked up at him, his mouth slightly open.

"Inheritance? Only heir?"

"Yes," the thing said, sounding as though its patience would soon snap. "An old family is one whose name can be traced back two centuries, by our system, and Potter counts as an old family."

"So I have inheritance?" Harry asked it quietly.

"One day, yes," the thing said with a beastly smile. "When you are of age you can claim your entire family fortune, and I'm not going to bother checking how much the Potter net worth amounts to now. You can find out when 17."

"So when I'm 17 I can get money that people left me?" Harry asked, head swimming.

"Most of it. _Some_ of it is available to you now."

"Ok," Harry said with gritted teeth, "Could I get access to it?"

"Do you have your key?"

A pause.

"Assume I don't."

"Then assume you can't."

"Ok, Mr-?"

The thing scowled, but said, "Bite-helm."

"Ok, Bite-Helm, I haven't been given any key by anyone. I would, however, like access to whatever money I could get at this stage. Can you tell me who has the key, or if you don't know, how I might gain access to my funds?"

"Of course, _sir_," it said. "Last known holder of your keys and details was Mr. Albus Dumbledore."

"Mr _Who?_ Who the hell is that and why – wait-" he said, suddenly recalling what he'd read about him. "Dumber – dumble-something. Headmaster of that school, isn't he?"

"Very good," it said sarcastically.

Harry ignored it, talking more to himself, saying, "Why the hell does the headmaster of that place have my account details!?"

"There was a small hearing to determine who would get them until they could be passed onto you. Albus Dumbledore won."

"What the hell would have happened if I hadn't gone to the fucking school?" Harry demanded, furious. "Why didn't my goddamned relatives get them?"

"Because," the beast said slowly, "your relatives are not magical people. They did not know anything about your inheritance for fear they might claim it."

Harry, indignant as he was, somehow saw the sense in this. _Money-grabbing, greedy selfish pigs probably would have spent it all on themselves and I'd have never seen a penny._

"Right," he said, trying to calm himself down. "So I can't change my name, and I can't get any of the money _my _family left me unless I go to this school until I'm of age. _Right_- Do magical people not understand the concept of _Blackmail_, or is it just not illegal?"

He was nearly shaking with suppressed anger.

"Am I to understand," the goblin asked slowly, "that Mr. Harry Potter isn't set on attending Hogwarts?"

"Like – I'm – Being – Given – A – Choice."

The goblin considered him for a long while.

"When you first entered," it said, "I believed you might be under the instruction of Dumbledore or one of his puppets. How did you get introduced to this world if not by them?"

"I found my own way."

"Ok," it said. "You've had no assistance at all from the Headmaster? Or the government?"

"No. I was sent a letter saying go to King's Cross on September 1st but otherwise no."

"I see."

And with that, the goblin got up and walked out.

"What – the – _fuck_?" Harry asked out loud, exasperated.

The door he'd exited from lay closed and lifeless for a long minute. Harry, his mood rapidly deteriorating, debated whether or not to simply get up and go- was he supposed to? Had he been dismissed?

_Fuck finding my own way out of this maze,_ he thought.

Suddenly though, as he was about to leave and was indeed on his feet, the goblin walked back in.

"Mr Potter," it said. "I have double checked with my superiors, and the law is very clear. Despite you being a minor, we have evidence that money that should be rightfully yours has not been granted to you. Due to this _human_ error, we are able to reimburse you from the funds of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, according to the Founders' and Students' Treatise of 1000 AD."

"What?" Harry asked dumbly.

"The full sum of Ten Thousand Galleons may be taken from the School's official vault, number 72, and placed into a new one that shall remain yours until you spend every last Knut within it."

"Holy shit."

The thing grinned at him, sounding very pleased as it said, "The best part from your side, Mr. Potter, is that even when the money is correctly repaid as it should be from the Headmaster of the school to you, you will not have to return a single Galleon you have spent of the school's."

Harry didn't understand, and said so.

"Well, Mr Potter," Bite-Helm said as he reclaimed his seat behind the stone desk. "Due to this injustice, and because as much as we goblins do not like your government we _really_ do not like your pretentious Headmaster, you can double your preliminary funds in the magical world. The gold you'd have got before you were 17 will now be twice as much, and if after a year the Headmaster of the school has not repaid your money in full, or at least given you the key to your vault, you will legally be able to sue the man for compensation, which could equal millions."

"He isn't _my_ headmaster," Harry mumbled, not understanding any of this.

"Ah," said Bite-helm, now looking awkward. "There's a catch. The law requires you to be a member of the school for this to apply."

"Oh, great - _Fucking _great. That's perfect- no matter what happens, I _have_ to go to this fucking school. Doesn't matter what _I_ feel, no. As long as I go to the school- if it isn't blackmail it's fucking bribery. Will I get arrested if I don't go, now?"

"Do not misunderstand me, Mr. Potter," the goblin said. "Gringotts doesn't want you at that school and under the wing of that old owl any more than you want to be. But when we tax the school on behalf of students, not only does the _student_ make profit- the bank does too. You would profit, and so would we… and anyone who aided the bank to its own profit would be remembered and regarded _very_ highly in future financial matters."

After glancing at the greedy little monster, Harry held his head in his hands, utterly confused. This was more than his 11 year old mind could cope with.

"For fuck's sake," he said. "I don't care- fine, do it. Fucking do it. I don't care, ok? Make the money, for you and me, if you want. It doesn't matter. Looks like no matter what the hell happens I'll end up being at the school."

"Aha, yes, but the treatise dictates that as long as you aren't expelled from the school, you only need to be there a year."

At this, Harry looked up.

"Only a year?"

"In which time you are unlikely to have spent even an eighth of what would be contained in the vault."

"Only one year? A school year or a whole twelve months?"

"Just one school year."

"Ok," Harry said after a moment of dead silence. "Alright, I'll do it, fine- As long as I get the money."

"Oh, I wholeheartedly agree with that statement," Bite-Helm said. He pushed over a sheaf of the thick parchment and an inked quill.

Harry glanced at it, tired and miserable, and signed _H. Potter_ at the bottom where indicated.

"Thank you, Mr. Harry Potter, and congratulations on your new vault: Number 1188."

"Right, just give me some money and I'll go. I have things to do."

"Of course, young sir," the goblin said in all politeness. Suddenly it shouted, "Horn-Rot!"

* * *

Harry felt a lot better now. 

He'd refilled both of his magical sacks with gold from his impressive new vault, and rather more satisfyingly, one of his mid-sized compartments with simple black leather lining was full to the brim with gold coins. Shrunken with the 'Away' command and snug in his pocket, the tiny trunk weighed less than a feather. Thanks to the enchantments on it even when in its full size it only weighed about as much as a fair-sized book, even with his home-made library and bank vault inside it.

The combination that would open the Vault he'd been committing to memory- he already knew the obvious 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 opened the emergency compartment, at present empty apart from his home-made list of combinations for the rest of the compartments; 2 – 1 – 4 – 3 opened the one he kept his few clothes in, 3 – 2 – 1 – 4 was his library, and now 2 – 4 – 3 – 1 opened his mini-bank vault.

He'd never been overly hot at maths, but he'd worked it out that there were 24 separate compartments that opened when all four locks were tapped in various orders, the sizes ranging from 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 being the smallest, the size of the outside skin of the chest, and 4 – 3 – 2 – 1 being the largest- the size of his room at the Swinging Lantern with grey silk walls that a ladder rolled out into from where it stuck into one of the silk walls.

Harry had not yet worked up the courage or need to actually get into it, but he was working up to it.

He'd begun spending his money from the sacks with relish. He'd bought some strange sweet concoction from a kind-faced vendor in Yellowstone Plaza off Diagon Alley, a new silver earring from _Coffers & Bangles Finery_, and a new cloak (he was growing, strangely, to like them) from a place called _Madame Malkin's_.

He was just now stepping into _Flourish & Blott's_ bookshop to stock up on reading material, his who-knows-what-number time in the shop recently, feeling so pleased with himself he held the door for a girl near his own age who dragged her mother in by the hand, clearly over-eager…

A girl with bushy brown hair and buck-teeth.


	7. The Many Meetings

_Allen Pitt - Thanks for your reviews. They are thoughtful and good insight. Fortunately I hope I've covered any patches as well as they should be covered... you'll see what I mean. Dumbledore's biggest problem is that he underestimates people in the region of naughtiness and overstimates people in the region of good. He's easily the most fun character of this story to write- he has some nice dialogue later on, and when he finally meets Harry... let's just say I enjoyed myself. I promise you though, there is a reason for this odd little plot device involving Master Potter's key. No matter how articulate, intelligent and devious a plan may seem, without a contingency it will rarely completely succeed. This holds true for both Harry and Albus. They think themselves far too clever._

_Hemotem - Cheers for your reviews and ideas. I'm kinda ahead of you, but it's reassuring to have someone on a similar wavelength to me. I hope you enjoy the future chapters though I think you might :)_

_Inziladun - I just finished the first of four planned books in Unforgiven. It's 13 chapters long. Thats 60,000+ words, 165 A4 pages in a size 11 font, and only a quarter of what I have planned (which will be at least 60 chapters of 15 pages/5,000+ words each). I hope that'll end up long enough for you ;)_

_Tmctflyboy and Jbarber69 - Once a week on sunday or monday I'll have a new chapter up, unless someone close to me dies. That way there aren't piles of chapters uploaded at once and then periods with nothing at all; I can pace myself, review things already written, patch stuff up and still have a steady output. Sorry but you'll need to read just one a week, unless you wait until the story is finished and come back to it to read them all at once. Again I apologise- on stories before I've posted as soon as I've finished and I've always regretted it. I personally hate reading chapter by chapter but I like insight into them that will help me create a better vision._

_Sear and Amarthiel - I hope you aren't disappointed with the meetings. As much as Harry may need a friend, it's not going to happen just like that. He'll meet the characters, because that's unavoidable, but then a wonderful invention comes into play known as 'original characters'... and nothing will be as it seems anyway. One thing I pride myself on is reasonably consistent characters- I'm very strict about it. As for HPHG, Sear... my personal favourite, but not quite in keeping with my plotline. Don't worry ;)_

_wtf - Snape's no Hero. He's brilliantly complicated. And yes, it is indeed my story._

_question - She's eleven years old. I think you're on the wrong site._

_To everyone else, especially multiple reviewers, many thanks! I hope you'll enjoy the coming chapters. Your thoughts are always welcome :)_

_As are flames. They keep me warm._

_Enjoy and Peace to y'all. GL_

* * *

Albus sat, listening patiently to the drivel the Minister was spewing endlessly, in a plush oak office that was far more garish than his own, his head tilted in a practised manner that made him look as though he was listening and seriously considering every word the Minister for Magic said. 

"-but of course," Fudge chuckled slightly, his chins wobbling, "Such an idea is entirely preposterous. Extend the St. Mungo's budget more than it already has been! Gracious, what on Earth could give these people the gall to suggest something so dire- our pockets getting shallower by the minute and it isn't as though people are getting any sicker, is it? It's all that Humphreys. He's been -"

"Cornelius," Albus said suddenly.

"-All over th – what? Sorry?"

"As fascinating as this is, there's something requiring your more immediate attention."

The Headmaster, alert now and a little curious, pointed towards the window of the office.

"Wha-" Fudge half-asked as he turned. Then he saw. "Oh, for _goodness'_ sake, how many times must people be told?"

He made no move to let the owl in, instead looking at the door to the room as though hoping his secretaries had become psychic in their absence and, sensing his distress, would rush to the rescue.

"Countless, I don't doubt, Cornelius, but that isn't a person. That's an owl."

"Yes," the Minister said with a scowl, "I'm perfectly aware of that, Professor."

"Oh, good," Albus said mildly.

The Minister got up, shooting a nasty look at Dumbledore, who remained seated, and he grumbled all the way to the window.

"Bloody owls- this window is for decoration, it isn't a post box, for Merlin's sake. How many times must I ask, address them to Minister Fudge's _office_, not me myself. Here-" he opened the latch of the window and snatched the letter from the beak of the owl, saying, "Now bugger off."

The owl, after shooting the Minister a baleful look, did as was told, and Fudge closed the window.

"Right, now what's so bloody urgent? Let me see- oh. _Oh._"

He stood with the letter unopened in his hands and Albus narrowed his eyes.

"What's the matter, Cornelius?"

"Hmm? Matter? What's the _bloody_ matter?" He shoved the envelope at Dumbledore who reflexively caught it.

"It's addressed to you. That's the _bloody _matter!"

Albus, now worried, tore at the paper as Fudge muttered about the 'Minister for Magic Postal Service'. He pulled it out into his hands and unfolded it steadily.

'_Professor Dumbledore, sir,'_ it scrawled across the parchment. '_He's bloody gone. No sign of him. I was going to talk to the Dursley family but knew I'd better ask first. But there ain't no sign of him anywhere at all- like he's never even lived there. Same family- just no Harry.'_

Dumbledore didn't read another word. He knew it was Hagrid. He knew something was very, very wrong, and that he'd soon be having a talk with Vernon and Petunia Dursley.

Very soon.

Without a word to the Minister he strode to the fireplace.

* * *

"But that one's smaller-" 

"Is it a weight set or a book?"

She blushed.

"Trust me," Harry told the girl. "This is fuller and more comprehensive- about a further 50 spells in it. No pictures, but better explanations. A sickle cheaper, too, I think."

She accepted it warily, but grateful, not sure if he was being serious. He didn't bother to smile at her- Harry Potter was not a socialite. He'd helped her out- that would do.

"Ok- thanks," she said, and smiled slightly.

"No worries," Harry said, turning away to look up at the shelves further down.

She'd been about to buy something not worth the paper it was on, and had been looking in the same section as he had, this strange bushy-haired young girl. Her mother was in some other section- Medical, he thought.

Her high voice asked, "Are you a wizard?"

He blew air out of his cheeks.

"Not many around here that aren't."

"Are – are you at Hogwarts?"

He slowly turned to her again, adjusting the six-or-so books under his arm.

"Err – soon will be, I guess."

"Oh!" she said, relieved. "Oh, I'm just starting this year too- you look older!"

"…Thanks."

She suddenly seemed stuck for words. Harry just looked at her.

"You – err – I'm Hermione."

"You're a _what?_"

She blushed and said, "No- Her-My-Oh-Nee, it's my name."

"Oh," Harry said, fighting down the urge to say 'Congratulations'. He figured he'd better respond, so said, "Harry."

"Pleasure," she told him, smiling.

He refrained from sighing, turning towards the shelves again and reaching his free arm up to pluck Truman Esching's _Biological Transmogrification_ from its perch.

She was a well-to-do young girl from a presumably non-magical family, he'd decided. Posh parents- judging from her Mum's perusal of the Medical section at least _she_ was a doctor of some sort. This girl- his future classmate?- was harmless and a little irritating. On the streets twenty minutes walk from here, on her own, she'd have been mugged before she could spell it out loud.

"So," she was saying, "Do you have any idea what classes we'll have to take?"

He said, "There's a booklist with the letter, should have your subjects on there."

"Oh, of course."

A pause.

"Do you think they'll be very hard? I haven't got a wand yet," she said.

He didn't trust himself to respond, so he just shrugged.

"I -"

"Hermione!" a female voice said.

"Oh- oh, yes, coming Mum!" She shouted at her mother, who stood near the counter. She turned to Harry and said, "Well- I'll – err – see you at school then, Harry."

"Yes. Bye."

He heard her go after a beat. _I can't wait,_ he couldn't help but think. He went further into the shop and didn't hear the bell ring as the girl left a few minutes later.

_Twenty of those in my class and, money or no, a twenty foot wall won't keep me in that school._

When he'd bought about twenty books he left the shop- this was about an hour later. At this point it was beginning to grow dark. He had one more stop to make today- this one at the darker end of Knockturn Alley- and set off with his hood up as usual.

Immersed as he was in his own thoughts, he didn't notice someone following him.

_Shall I go and get them tonight, or tomorrow in the day?_ He thought to himself. He needed cigarettes- a _shit-load_, if he was going to board at some strange school for a year- and he'd had exchanged at Gringotts more than £50 in notes before he'd left the bank earlier that day. _I'm dying for one, and there should be an off-license open somewhere the other side of that barrier… but can I be bothered? _He was remembering in his head the last time he'd bought cigarettes- or rather, the last time he'd gone to a cigarette vendor. The shopkeeper had tried to throw him out, and Harry had run off with two ten packs.

He turned out of Diagon Alley and into Knockturn Alley, where there were no streetlights, dodging late-shoppers and comically shady characters in every direction until he reached the end and the oppressive alley opened into Knockholt Square, tall and made of black stone, which he crossed towards one of the narrower shops on the other side of the open plaza.

He entered and walked to the teller, a girl in her early twenties with multi-coloured dreadlock hair in a high ponytail, piercings covering every inch of skin on her face, standing behind a crooked and musky-smelling counter filing her exceptionally long nails.

"We're closed," she told him, not looking up.

"I know," Harry said calmly. "I'd like to book an appointment for tomorrow."

"What do you want done?"

"Ink."

"Ink session-Plain or specialist?"

"Specialist, please."

"Big or small, and where?"

"I'm not sure."

"Right," she said, ignoring her nails finally and leaning over a large leather-bound book with yellow parchment as pages. "Name?"

"Book it under 'Shujin'."

"Shoe – gin. Right."

"At around midday?"

"Fine."

"See you then."

"Bring money with you, ok?"

"Of course. Good night."

A tattoo was something Harry had always dreamed of having- of what, he didn't care overly, which is why he'd never had one done… _yet._ But this shop had caught his eye a few days ago. It sold not only normal tattoos, but 'specialist' tattoos- aka magically enchanted ones. He had no idea what sort of things they could do, but he wanted one.

He stepped out of the parlour onto the wet stone of the street, looking around him, and he finally noticed his tail- some random with his hood up trying to look inconspicuous by staring into the window of a closed shop.

Harry frowned, not looking for too long, and set off towards Diagon Alley again, deciding to postpone his addiction until tomorrow.

When his tail followed his heart began beating faster.

He walked briskly through the nearly-deserted Knockturn Alley, hearing the footsteps of the person behind him speed up, _tap – tap – tap_, and with a thought his wand was in his hand.

_Tap – tap – tap – tap – tap -_

He drew his dagger with his other hand, ignoring the speed of his heart.

_Thud – thud – thud – thud –_

_Tap – tap – tap – tap –_

_Tap thud – tap thud – tap thud – tap thud –_

He span on his heel.

His tail stopped walking abruptly.

_Tha-Thud – Tha-thud – Tha-thud – Tha-thud –_

They stared at each other, neither seeing the other's eyes.

_Thud Thud Thud Thud Thud Thud Thud Thud Thud -_

The man turned, presumably having seen his wand and dagger out, and walked away.

_Tha-thud – tap – tha-thud – tap – tha-thud – tap - thud – tap – thud – tap – thud – tap – thud – tap – thud … thud … thud … thud …_

Harry stood, unnerved, watching until the figure had walked out of sight.

Then he started breathing again.

As he turned and walked on, this time in the silence of the alley, he sheathed his dagger, but his wand remained in his grasp.

* * *

As usual, when the doorbell rang, Dudley and Vernon didn't move from their after-dinner Television. Petunia got up, as usual, and moved to the hallway. 

What _was_ unusual was the hour of this caller- Petunia wondered who it might be at this time in the evening. Her mind drew blanks.

It was with a frown that she opened the door… and with a scream that she slammed it shut again.

Her shout of fright and the slam of the door finally raised Vernon from his sofa, and he came bumbling into the hallway, moustache bristling.

"What's the matter?" He asked Petunia. She simply stood, back turned, staring at the door with her hands on her mouth.

The doorbell rang again, and it made both Dursleys jump.

"Who is it?" He asked Petunia, a note of urgency in his whisper. His mind was jumping to November 2nd, 10 years before, when his wife had opened the door to find their ill-begotten nephew landed in their laps.

Had he come back? Did Petunia have some other relative who'd met with an unfortunate accident and left their ungrateful spawn on their doorstep?

Petunia slowly moved to the door and Vernon watched through narrowed eyes, expecting everything and anything but who it actually was.

"Good evening," Albus Dumbledore said politely.

Petunia didn't scream this time. She fainted dead away. Vernon would have gone to her, but at the moment all of his attention was firmly on the old man on his doorstep and the long, purple robes he was wearing.

"Who are you?" he demanded loudly.

Dumbledore's eyes moved from Petunia Dursley to Vernon as he stepped into the hallway.

Closing the door behind him gently, he said, "Albus Dumbledore. Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry… you must be Vernon?"

Vernon Dursley had gone pale.

"Get – get out. I want you out of this house!"

"Of course," the old man replied. "All in due time. First, however, I would like the answers to a few queries of mine, if that is alright?"

"Absolutely not," Vernon said gruffly, finally moving to his wife.

"Splendid," Dumbledore replied, stepping past the fallen woman and moving into the house.

"I'll call the police!"

"Mr. Dursley, where is Harry Potter?"

Vernon went paler. He looked with a newfound fear upon the wizened figure, who- for all his benevolent appearance- had suddenly taken on a frosty edge.

"Dead," he said shortly, tearing his eyes from the old man, determined not to show fear as he helped his wife.

"Oh dear," Albus said.

When Petunia had been revived and had shrieked herself into furious tears, and Vernon Dursley had gone as red as tanned hide in protest, Dumbledore had moved the procession into the living room. With the television off, Dudley merely stared at the old man in his house dumbly.

"Mr and Mrs Dursley, I must know where Harry Potter is if he is not with you."

"He – he's dead, damn you!" Vernon said through clenched teeth.

"Do you have a death certificate?" Dumbledore asked, stomach filling with lead.

"God," Petunia burst out. "He – he ran away. He ran away after he did some of that goddamned _freaky_ magic at our son and his friends at school. Ungrateful _wretch._"

"Ran away?" Dumbledore asked faintly.

"Yes," Vernon said shortly. "So we expect he's dead."

"Hope," Dudley said quietly.

Dumbledore looked at them one by one.

"Harry Potter ran away from his family… alright. So, if I believe you, shall we say I'd like to know why?"

The family was silenced, the only sounds being made as Petunia wept into her hands.

"When was the last time you saw him?"

"Years ago," Vernon said. "He was… seven or eight - One year less than Dudley."

"Do you have any idea where he'd have gone?"

Silence.

"I trust you contacted the proper authorities after his disappearance?"

Silence still.

"You…" Dumbledore said, feeling light-headed. "You people… this family… you didn't even look for him?"

Dudley shook his head, saying, "They would have brought him back. When they found him."

No more was said. Dumbledore left the house, dismissed Hagrid and returned to his office to cry for the first time in a decade.

Harry Potter was gone.

* * *

Harry Potter had _actually_ just got his first tattoo. 

He didn't wince as he flexed his meagre muscle, displaying the artwork emblazoning his entire shoulder and upper arm. Instead, he grinned a self-indulgent and very smug smile.

"Suits you," the man remarked, his strange London accent at odds with his oriental appearance. "Didn't think it would. 'Course, the best part 'bout it bein' magic is that it'll expand as your arm does. No fuckin' stupid stretch marks."

His skin still prickled unpleasantly, feeling tender under the complex, beautiful artwork, but he pulled his cloak on again anyway and turned to the man. He was short- nearly as small as Harry himself- and completely hairless. His age was almost impossible to guess- every single inch of exposed skin was covered in a strange mix of tribal and oriental tattoos, including his very eyelids.

The man grinned, seeing Harry studying his face, and on the front of his two most prominent yellow teeth were what Harry guessed must have been Chinese symbols actually _carved_ into his teeth.

"How much do I owe you?" Harry asked, meeting his eyes.

"I'll take 5 for that one. Galleons, that is."

Harry fought the large coins out of the coinpurse, putting them down on the chair he'd recently vacated.

"Cheers, kid. Let me throw this in the back and get ya leaflet. One tick."

Before Harry could ask what 'leaflet' he was being given, the man had disappeared through his beaded curtains again.

He studied the room in silence- everywhere on the walls were those strange moving magic photographs he'd noticed everywhere. Most of them were of piercings or tattoos that varied in magnificence, but there were the occasional ones of the Chinese man or the dyed-hair girl who worked in the front with other people. Some they waved out of and others they merely stood silently, still, only nodding at Harry when he went for a closer inspection.

He walked sideways along the wall, looking at the nondescript faces that peered out at him- some were obviously just valued regular customers. Harry got quite a shock when he saw the first one on the wall who did not have a single tattoo or piercing on him.

He gasped very loudly, seeing a face he never thought he'd see again.

"Holy _shit_," he breathed.

He felt the man walk up behind him, but didn't turn around.

"Checkin' out me pics, eh. I don't mind- who's that then. Ah, yeah, a very good old friend o' mine. Died a few years ago- fuckin' shame. His name was-"

"I know his name," Harry said quietly. "Mito Nobunaga- He was my sensei."

* * *

"…What, with my brother getting arrested just the other day and taking a muggle bullet in the arm for his troubles- He always was an idiot, getting involved with that filthy riffraff," he said, taking another sip. They sat in silence for a minute, thinking. 

"What can you tell me about Harry Potter?" he suddenly asked.

Snape frowned.

"Nothing you don't already know, Lucius," he said mildly. "Have you heard something?"

"No- well, at least not from a verifiable source. Draco thought he saw someone at the bank."

"Someone who resembled Potter?"

"Apparently so."

Snape considered.

"Improbable. Dumbledore would have known he was there, and at the moment- as I already told you- Albus is in a total fluster because his little relocation program for our famous Potter went balls-up."

Lucius nodded, fist under his chin.

Snape sighed, "He'd have told me if anything new was happening."

"I know," the blonde man said. "But it makes me wonder. Draco knows the danger in giving me false information. His mother already disciplined him over saying he saw Potter, but he's adamant. Green eyes, scar…"

"No entourage? No gaggle of paparazzi?"

Lucius didn't smile at the jest. Snape frowned at him as he spoke.

"What if Potter was on his own?"

Snape shook his head, and said, "Impossible. Not in Diagon Alley at any rate. His relatives, according to the headmaster, are adamant he must be dead. Ran away years ago."

"Hmm," Lucius considered. "Perhaps. I suppose we'll see on September first."

"If Harry Potter is on that train, I'll eat my own words. But he won't be- it's not possible at all."

"Yes. But if he does return-"

"The world might rejoice, Lucius, that our little saviour has returned to us, but I personally won't be shedding any tears if the little bastard is never seen again."

Lucius considered. Then he lifted his glass.

"I'll drink to that."

* * *

"Oh," the man said. "Bloody Hell. What's yer name? I didn't check the bookin' sheet. He had a lot of students, old Mito." 

Harry felt a bit put out, but quashed it with a silent reprimand. _Of course he had other students- did you think you were special, Harry? He was an experienced teacher. You stupid bastard._

Out loud, he said, "He never knew my real name."

"Hah!" The man barked a laugh. "I know. Even if he had, he'd have called you somethin' different."

"He called me Shujin."

"He used to- wait… what did you say?"

Harry looked at him.

"Shujin was what he named me."

"You're shittin' me. He named _you_ Shujin!?" He laughed louder. "Holy fuck, that's ridiculous. I heard of you kid- devil with a blade, eh. Hah! I don't believe it. I never knew you were a wizard."

"Neither did I."

"Shi – it. He talked about you, that's for sure. Liked you, in his way."

"He gave me – when he died – he gave me his sword."

Suddenly Harry was feeling a little sting behind the eyes. He blinked.

"Not surprised. One second 'I'm done teaching, I'll never teach again,' the next thing you know, 'I have a new pupil'. Kept tellin' me you were different."

Harry didn't say anything. He didn't really know what to think of this.

"No offence," the man suddenly added. Harry finally smiled.

"It's ok. But," he asked, "You knew Mito well, right?"

"Yeah- he wasn't a relation or anything but we both learnt Muay Thai under Ichikan To at the same time. Those were the good old days. Even ancient as he was he creamed the fuck out of me."

"Then I think I can trust you," Harry said, his eyes on the picture. "Because I need help, and I've just thought, you might be able to give it to me."

He could sense the man frowning.

"I'll help Nobunaga's apprentice, of course, least I could do, but… What sort of help?"

Harry turned, and pulled off his beanie hat with one hand, and stared at him.

The man half-frowned, half-shrugged in confusion, then he caught sight of Harry's scar, and his eyes bulged and his jaw dropped. He stared for a solid second, then his eyes met Harry's, then they snapped up to his forehead again.

It seemed for once he was speechless.

"You see," Harry said quietly, "I don't want that reaction every time I walk in a room."

"Wha – I – but _you're_ Harry Potter. Holy shit- I just illegally inked the Boy-Who-Lived."

He gave another crackling burst of laughter.

"Alright," Harry said with a sigh. "But you can see why I don't want my scar on display all the time, right?"

"Holy – well, shit, I guess I can."

"Is there anything we could do about it? Some way I don't know of to hide it, other than wearing a hat?"

The man shook his head, eyes finally on Harry's again, frowning.

"Sorry, kid – Harry – er… Shujin?" He said, smiling again. "I have no idea. I'm not a makeup artist- just ink and holes. Unless I tattooed over it… but not only are you underage, that's illegal anyway."

Harry didn't mention that he didn't seem to have much problem doing it to _himself._

"Sorry mate. But, hey, you got a phone or something?"

"Never needed one."

"Well I reckon we should stay in contact- not to ride off your reputation or nothin', but you're the last pupil of Nobunaga, one of me closest ever friends. We could swap stories or somethin'."

"I don't have an owl…"

"Ah, neither do I, despise the little fuckers."

Harry stood there, looking at the man, who finally was looking everywhere _but_ his face.

"Well, we'll work something out, eh."

"Yeah- I just thought- What's your name?"

"Oh- shit, hah, didn't tell you already." He grimaced. "My mates call me Chow, because they know I hate it."

"O…k…"

"Actual name's Mike."

"Right," Harry said, and they shook hands.

"Alright, you probably need to go, eh. No worries boyo, but listen- if you ever need anything from London, or anythin' at all, get hold of me. I'm always here."

"Well- thanks, Mike. I'll owl you if I need something- and you do the same to me. I know most of non-magical London."

He felt a little foolish saying it, but it was only polite.

"Ah," Mike said. "Hate the place. Most of 'em are alright, but once you get involved with the Marksmen you kind of have to stay out of it for a bit."

Harry didn't ask.

"Crazy, trigger-happy bastards."

"They – those are the fuckers with the rings around their eyes, right?"

"Yeah. Never worked for 'em officially, but I used to _give_ them their little rings."

Harry nodded. Mike was a tattoo artist.

"I had a run in with them a while ago."

"I'm surprised you're still walking around, mate. But then if Nobunaga taught you, maybe I'm not too surprised."

"No," Harry said with a scowl, "They fucked me up. If I didn't have the art… er, _magic…_ I'd be dead."

"Shit- what happened?"

"I shot the cunts," Harry said without emotion.

Mike whistled.

"I can see why you'd avoid London then. Damn. And you're not even a fully grown wizard- wait, how old are you now?"

Harry shrugged, saying, "Eleven."

"Lucky bastard," Mike said, shaking his head. "Seriously. But- If you get trouble with them again, I could call in some favours."

"Cheers," Harry said, doubting he'd involve a single other soul if he was ever in their bad books again.

"But you- shit, you're going to Hogwarts then? Or not?"

"Well," Harry said, uncomfortable. "I might be."

"Shit- well, I'd doubt you would want to stay at my place, but I'll offer anyway."

Harry shook his head. He preferred his own company any day, and even if this guy knew his old Master, he'd still only just met him.

"Figured- no worries. Just had to be polite. But do you know about the station and shit? How're you gettin' there?"

Harry didn't know, and said, "I'll walk I guess."

"Right- well, I'll take you to King's Cross then. Shit- that's the day after tomorrow. Bloody hell- bloody _hell_," he repeated, staring into space. "You're gonna take the wizarding world by _storm_, bro, its gonna be fuckin' quality."

He gave that strange, delighted laugh again. Harry winced.

"Now," Mike continued, "I know you're probably used to livin' on your own. I was in the last war, I know you disappeared after it. Not your fault. Nobody knows what happened to you, but I ain't rude enough to ask you. But I'll offer to help you however I can."

"Well – er, much appreciated, Mike."

The man shook his head, and said, "Bollocks. I'll help you out. At the least I'll give you a lift to the station on the first."

"Thank you."

"No worries. Now- fuck off!" He laughed. "I've got customers, Shujin. But if you come here in the morning in a couple of days I'll drive you over."

As Harry left, lighting up a newly-stolen cigarette with the end of his wand, he tried to consider the person he'd just met. He was obviously friendly. He knew Nobunaga, apparently well. He was offering to help.

But Harry had gone a long, long time without any help at all.

He shoved the hat back on his head, pulling it down to his brow, and even then he pulled the hood of his cloak up. He went into the milling crowds heading down Knocturn Alley towards Diagon Alley, thinking inadvertently of the strange would-be mugger the night before.

_Stranger and stranger_, he thought.

As much as he might like it there, he knew he wouldn't miss Diagon Alley when he left.


	8. The Journey North

_Again, many thanks to my reviewers :) I would respond to them but most questions are answered soon enough anyway. Please Enjoy, GL._

* * *

Harry made just one more interesting purchase before the morning of September 1st. It was a gorgeous silver pendant in the shape of a gazing eye, the pupil of a shiny black rock that reflected everything yet nothing.

Despite its beauty, its aesthetics weren't what had drawn him to it. When Dark Magic took place nearby, depending on its strength, the amulet would hum and buzz on his chest so he would be alerted to it. It would apparently give him a vague idea of what and from where.

Thinking sensibly, he'd realised that if he was some queer little hero in the magical world, he might end up in trouble with certain people. Celebrities got shot a lot- it was hard enough to stay alive when you were _unknown_. He was stepping into a world where people every day, every turning he made, would know his name.

He wasn't going to take unnecessary risks. He'd got it for just ten sickles from an old merchant called Fuccino who had a well-known and widely respected stall in Knockholt Square.

It saved his life on his last night there- someone tried to curse him and he successfully ducked, his amulet having warned him. The would-be-mugger (who was different to the man who had attempted before in many ways, including smell, dress and basic intelligence) had received a dagger up through the base of the jaw, the tongue, the roof of the mouth and into the brain via the path of least resistance. Harry had walked on, not loitering to discover his attacker's fate.

He fell asleep after cleaning his dagger.

* * *

Before he knew it, it was four o'clock on the morning of the first of September. He was lying in bed, staring at the top of the four-poster. 

In a dream-like daze, he packed his things up, walked downstairs and paid for his board. He then left, walking through the empty streets, dawn not yet peeking over the horizon. He walked to the alley he'd first entered Diagon Alley from, looking at the well-hidden barrier. He put an arm through, not shuddering at the sensation but wanting to. He'd pulled his arm back. Then put it through, then pulled it back.

He looked up at the dark blue sky, breathing out heavily.

He stepped back, looking at the entrance to Knockholt he could see. He looked at the wet-brick-looking barrier again.

_Go? _He thought.

He looked at the sky.

_Stay?_

He leaned against the solid wall at his back, flicked the bottom of his cigarette packet, and lit one with his wand.

_Go?_

Puff. Smoke plumed in the morning wind.

_Stay?_

"Shit," he swore to himself.

_The wizard's world. This strange, queer place that somehow feels like home... though I've never felt a home… _or_ non-magic London. What's for me back there? Sleeping rough on rooftops and getting involved in crime. Or getting a mundane job, or joining some shit little school. But what's for me here? What's for me at this Hogwarts place?_

Puff. He closed his eyes.

_Danger. I'm a fucking celebrity here, for Christ's sake. Do I stay unknown, or do I launch myself into the spotlight?_

"Ah," he said to himself with a rueful, angry smile. "Always one extreme or the other."

_Money, here. If I stay at that school for a year._

Puff.

_Danger._

His lips burnt- he'd finished his cigarette, in no time, it seemed.

_But… but fuck it. I'm not Harry Potter- I was only ever Harry Potter to the Dursleys, and they treated me like shit. I've been better off on my own. So… so I'll stay on my own. I'll stay Shujin- fuck 'Harry Potter'. Fuck this scar and this reputation. When I go to this school and learn all the shit it can teach me, I could rule the world. I could lead the Marksmen- none of them could stand up to me. I could kill all of them too, the bastards. I could be ridiculously powerful. If I just last out this school. I can stay on my own- fuck workmates. School mates. Even at school when younger I was on my own._

_I am Harry Potter..? No. Fuck that name. I am Shujin. I am my Sensei's student. I wonder how many wizards, not including Mike, know Martial Arts. Know the Art of swordplay. I have the opportunity to rule the world- but I won't, because that would put me in the place I hate again. So I'll be strong enough to, but wise enough to not._

_Fuck it,_ he thought viciously. _I might even earn this motherfucking reputation._

He stood still for a few moments more, his long leather coat billowing in the wind, then he walked away from the trick-wall and went back into the wizard part of London, heading towards Mike's place.

The sun started to rise.

_Fuck it all.

* * *

_

Mike, it turned out, didn't drive a car. He drove a motorbike.

"An Indian Chief," he told Harry proudly, shoving a helmet on. "Its owner met with an unfortunate accident, and I was there at the opportune moment."

Harry had to admit it looked nice- he knew nothing at all about cars or bikes- he'd never even been on a bus, always walking everywhere- but this strange, old-fashioned red two-wheeler looked hot.

They were at King's Cross in very little time, so Harry began to see the advantages of owning a vehicle. Knowing all the shortcuts he did the walk would have taken him the better part of forty minutes. Stepping off the bike (though feeling a bit uncomfortable around the groin and lower back) he felt like he'd just sat down.

He began to thank Mike, but the Chinese man pulled something off the back of the bike- a strange, oddly shaped package- and gestured inside.

He led them to a blank brick wall, and looked at his watch.

"The barrier opens at 10, so we have a couple of minutes to wait. Look- I got you this."

He pulled the cover off the package, and Harry saw it was a cage. Inside the cage was a sleek black raven. Harry stared.

"Are you fucking joking-"

"Nope. Can't stand owls, but Ravens are what they use in Eastern Europe. He doesn't have a name, but he's a damn quick flier, or so I'm told. Got 'im off a mate of mine, he's quite young I think. Anyway, he's yours. They're the smartest of all birds- a damn sight cleverer than owls. They also fly better at night, I know that much."

Harry stared at him.

"I can't accept this."

"Fuck off, 'course you can."

"No, I really can't. This is – I can't. My Sensei remains the only person to have _ever_ given me a single thing, and that was when he was dead. Please- don't try."

"Bollocks," Mike said. "This ain't just for you, brat. This is so we can communicate- I meant what I said about you getting in touch with me if you ever needed it."

"Yeah, but-"

"No, no buts at all, for fuck's sake. You'll find you'll need a courier more than ever when you get to that school."

Coming off the subject of the raven, Harry asked quietly, "What's it like?"

"Hogwarts? Shit, it's ok. You'll get used to it. Lots of rules I never agreed with, but they aren't hard to break."

"I might leave after a year."

"Well, don't make your mind up just yet. Get a taste first, you know. Besides, there's always Durmstrang or somethin' if you can't stand it. But Durmstrang's a bit of a shit-hole and that French one is full of pussies."

Harry sighed.

"We'll see," is all he said.

"Yes we will. And you'll also take this raven and message me whenever the fuck you like. I don't care. Since I left the Marksmen, came back to magical London, I've been bored as sin. I love my job, but," he shrugged. "Fuckin' dry. Take the bird, man."

Harry stared at him.

Somewhere in the station a bell chimed, and Harry glanced at the clock near the Platform 10 sign.

"Shit," Mike said. "I need to go to work again. See you around, Kid."

He gave a half-wave, leaving the caged bird on the floor in front of him.

"Just walk through the wall. I have to run."

And run he did. Harry was left on his own with a caged raven in front of him.

He sighed and picked up the cage, looking at the bird inside then at the blank wall in front of him. He looked from the clock back to the wall.

"Walk through the wall," he said to himself, thinking of his deliberation earlier that morning. "Knew I'd end up doing it at some point."

He plunged through.

* * *

_The Art of Runic engravings,_ the introduction read, _is an ancient and undervalued practise that, when performed correctly, can give enhanced and in cases extreme abilities to the user. Such basic carvings as the Runic for 'Clarity', pronounced Khamip, can give vision such as an owl has at night when searching for prey. Modern society views the practise of carving runes onto oneself as grim and even Dark due to its macabre nature, despite its obvious benefits._

Harry looked up, rubbing his eyes to fight his headache. The train had still not left.

The station outside his window had filled with all manner of families, most of them looking almost sickeningly normal, and even now, this late, it was a hive buzzing with activity.

Only two people, looking into the compartment Harry had to himself, had opened the door. Both had quickly shut it again, on seeing him. Harry wondered what he looked like to them- green eyes, skull-tight woollen beanie pulled low, cigarette dangling out of his lips, long leather trench coat and an earring. Oh, and a black raven perched on his shoulder. Whereas they looked like… well, normal kids.

_Whilst not practised commonly,_ the book went on; _the arts therein described are not illegal. They are somewhat frowned upon, however. That shall be the first and last warning I give you._

Harry frowned at the pretentiousness of this obviously proud author, but continued on. He'd got past the introduction and read some of the more-basic examples, and was seriously considering looking into this, when the door opened again. He didn't look up.

_Strength Enhancers- often embodied in the form of a particular animal, physical enhancements are not visual. The only visual mark is that of the rune itself. However, that of the Leopard, as pictured below, would increase speed. That of the bear would increase brute strength- that of the Lion might increase courage._

The door hadn't closed yet.

_However, often a rune such as this requires a counter, for where you would be glad of the beneficial sides of these animal runes, often you would acquire some bad traits along with them- for instance, in the above examples, the Leopard would not only increase speed, but might detriment one's stamina. Short bursts of speed would be impressive, but running for a long time would quickly find one feeling tired. The bear might not only make one stronger, but clumsier. The Lion users would find themselves unduly proud and stubborn. The-_

"Uh…" a voice from the doorway said.

Harry looked up. Standing there was a gangly, awkward looking red-head.

"Do you – do you mind if I sit in here? Only – only everywhere else is full."

Harry's still unnamed Raven croaked loudly. The redhead jumped.

"Sure," Harry said, uninterested. "Sit where you like."

"Thanks."

Harry went back to reading, but was distracted by the fussing of the redhead. From the corner of his eye he took in the boy's too-short clothes and tattered attire. He took in his unconfident appearance, the strange, fixed stare he gave things that interested him. He noticed he smelt faintly of a rodent of some kind.

"Your – er, your bird."

"My raven?" Harry looked at him.

"Yeah. Er – what's he called?"

Harry shrugged.

"Doesn't have a name yet. Got him today."

"Oh," he said, looking like he wanted to suggest something. "Do you want to meet Scabbers?"

Harry looked at him.

"He's my rat."

"Right. Well," Harry said, pointing at his raven. "I don't know what this guy eats yet, but if you want to risk it, it's your call."

He went back to his book, but saw the redhead had decided against it.

A few minutes passed in silence, Harry finding he couldn't concentrate on this much at present. He folded the book away, not getting his trunk out but sitting the tome next to him on the seat. He looked at the boy, who was avoiding his eyes.

Harry thought to himself, _I suppose if I'm spending a year with this kid, I should try to be sociable._ He grimaced. He wasn't good with socialising, especially not with normal kids his own age.

"So… you new at Hogwarts?"

"Yeah," the boy said. "First year. Hopefully a Gryffindor."

"Right," Harry said, recalling the House names from _Hogwarts: a History_.

"I'm Ron."

"I'm Shu-" he stopped himself. "I mean- I'm Harry."

"Harry?"

"Yes."

"Ok," the boy- Ron- said. "Do you- have any brothers or sisters?"

"No."

"Oh," Ron said. "Lucky."

"Not many people would call me lucky."

Silence.

Harry had never had a pet before, but suddenly he thought he might know how to name it. He picked up the book, the bird shuffling on his shoulder, and opened it to where he'd finished.

"What are you reading?"

"Something about runes. One second," Harry said, flicking through.

He found Raven.

_Attributes include stealth and, like most birds, stamina and on the reverse side the user might find themselves acquiring a taste for fresh, raw meat. _Blah, blah, Harry skimmed over the paragraph. _Translates to 'Mar __hræfn__'_.

"Mar," he said out loud. He looked at the bird, which was obviously uninterested and happy to simply sit there atop his shoulder.

"Mar?" Ron asked dubiously.

"Perhaps," Harry replied. "But he'll probably just be 'Bird' when he's fucking me around."

Ron laughed and gasped at the same time, maybe because of his language. Harry shrugged. _Better to get the kid used to it,_ he thought.

They spoke of a few other mundane things, Harry growing quickly bored and itching to get out of this train compartment and back onto the platform and to run away back into London and find a nice quiet rooftop and sit in peace, until the conversation dried up and he meditated silently to calm himself down.

After a few more seconds of silence, the bird 'Mar' suddenly spontaneously gave a loud _Caw_ and jumped from his shoulder, flying to the floor.

Harry looked at it, then saw what it had seen, and he shouted at it.

"Mar! Bird! Stop-"

But it was too late. It had the green lump in its talons and it flew back up to Harry's shoulder.

"Stop it, fucking bird-"

He rescued the small amphibian from its claws- the tiny thing wasn't even moving- and held it in one hand.

"Don't eat that, it probably belongs to someone."

"What is it?" Ron asked.

Harry looked at it, and answered, "A toad or frog."

Harry didn't know why he'd saved the little creature's life, but he had for some reason. He just knew that whatever the bird ate, it shouldn't be other people's pets.

Mar looked at him reproachfully.

He handed it to Ron, the bird's eyes following it all the way, but it didn't go after it.

"Eurgh- its still alive."

Harry actually laughed at the boy's reaction. He then had a start when he realised the train was already moving- he hadn't noticed it set off. It was already clear of the station.

He looked at the bird and he met the animal's eyes. _I suppose that was a good start,_ he thought mildly. _I need treats or something. Dead treats._ He didn't dare pat the bird's head- it was giving him a look that implied the bird would _not_ enjoy that one bit, but might enjoy one of Harry's fingers in place of the toad.

The journey from then was mostly uneventful- an old lady came past and asked them if they wanted food, and neither of them did. Ron made pointless chatter, going on about his family or this Quidditch sport Harry had read of. One of only two other things of note occurred when the door slid open soon after the trolley lady disappeared.

"Have either of you seen- oh, it's there!" a female voice said.

"What?" Ron asked- she was looking at him.

"The toad- it's a boy called Neville's."

"Oh- Harry rescued it from his bi- raven."

"Hello, Hermione."

"Oh!" She exclaimed, seeing him. "Oh- you. _You're_ in trouble."

Harry frowned.

She came in and sat down, saying, "_You're _Harry Potter. You didn't - I didn't know who you were, before."

"Ok," Harry said, ignoring Ron's reaction.

He hoped everyone wasn't going to be like that. The kid's eyes were bulging out of his head, he looked like an idiot. He fought down a scowl.

"You're Harry Potter?" he asked faintly.

"So I'm told."

"But – but you're-"

"Anyway, well done for coming, Harry. I didn't think you would, after what you said," Hermione told him.

She certainly seemed more confident now.

"Right. Thanks," Harry said.

"Well – well I'd better give Neville his toad back. He's-" she said, but stopped, suddenly noticing his raven. "Oh- whose raven is that?"

"It's his," Ron said, still seemingly in a daze.

"But – but birds other than owls aren't allowed!"

Harry gave her an eloquent look.

"Oh – oh, ok. Honestly… well – well you two had best change into your robes soon, we're nearly halfway there!"

Soon afterwards she left, flustered, and Ron looked like he'd love to dive out of the compartment too. Suddenly he was a lot more tongue-tied.

Harry ignored him.

For a short time after that on the long train journey there was silence, which was how Harry liked it- he didn't talk at lengths to many people, especially those his own age- but as soon as Ron regained his courage and started talking again the door slid open.

"I knew it," a blonde boy said.

Harry looked at him. He stood framed in the doorway by two fat kids.

"What?" he asked.

"I knew it was you. When I saw you in Gringotts. Go on- take your hat off."

Harry didn't move.

The blonde boy suddenly reached forwards clumsily, and Harry dodged his hand, beginning to get annoyed.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"Take it off- let's see your scar."

Harry stood up- he towered over the shrimpy kid.

"I think you should leave," he said simply.

"I beg you're pardon? _I'm_ Draco Malfoy. This is Crabbe-" he gestured, "and this is Goyle. And- oh, lord, _you're_ a Weasley."

Before Ron could respond, Harry said, "And _I'm_ not someone to piss off. I don't give a shit who you are- you aren't rude to me or my acquaintances."

Draco gaped.

"I – well, er – Potter, there are some Wizard families who-"

"I – don't - give - a – shit. Get out."

Draco scoffed, but said nothing.

"Look, whoever you are, I'm only going to ask you nicely this last time. Leave."

The boy turned around, looking mortally offended, and Harry took his hand off the hilt of his dagger, calming himself down. He turned slightly to sit down again.

Then Malfoy, out of the corner of Harry's eye, lunged for the hat and hooked a finger in it before Harry could get out of the way. _IDIOT, Harry!_

Malfloy's moment of triumph was just that- a single heartbeat. Then Harry grabbed him by the collar with both hands and head-butted him.

His forehead landed right in the flesh above the nose, his brow making contact for the barest of seconds in the bridge of the nose, and then the boy was suddenly, silently falling. Harry's beanie flew away.

The goons were ridiculously slow- Harry simply shoved them out of the compartment. He booted the prone form of Draco Malfoy out after them- the boy weighed nothing.

Slamming the door, he conjured his wand into his hand and locked it wordlessly.

It all happened in about 2 seconds flat.

"Oh, Merlin," Ron breathed after a beat.

"Not Merlin- Harry Potter."

The sounds of banging on the door lasted for about a minute. By that time they could see the castle.

* * *

"Is this a school or a fucking fortress?" Harry asked himself, staring across the lake to the towering stone structure.

"A bit of both according to Hogwarts: a History."

"Yes, Hermione," Harry said. "It was rhetoric."

"Firs' years! Firs' years this way!" A voice boomed from further down the platform.

The form beckoning them was mammoth. He was easily the height of two grown men- Harry doubted even with his sword he could kill this man. He loomed even bigger as he got closer.

The huge man, bearded like a pirate, seemed to be searching for something or someone among them. His eyes passed over Harry, looked over all of them, and he called out for first years once more. Disappointed for whatever reason, the huge man then turned around and led them off.

Malfoy was near the front of the crowd, glaring daggers at Harry. As they were bustled towards the shore as one group Harry got into earshot.

"Hey, Malfoy," he said quietly. The boy turned. "You've got a little red mark there-"

He pointed to the bridge of his nose. Malfoy flushed pink.

That sort of ridiculous, pointless taunting was usually below Harry, but the kid had really pissed him off on the train. He allowed himself a smirk as he moved away.

As they reached the little pier, Mar flew off and above them. Harry let it do this- he didn't know how or care to stop it anyway. _Better let it find something to eat or whatever it does,_ he thought. Then, suddenly, he thought, _I hope it comes back._

For some reason, as soon as he thought it, he felt reassured that it would. He didn't know why, he just knew it.

In his boat was Ron, Hermione and the boy with the toad. Harry was trying to think where he remembered him from.

They set off automatically across the lake, no rowing needed, and although the rest of the first years made little noises of awe and surprise, he rolled his eyes. Even _he_ could have managed that trick, and he hadn't been taught anything yet.

The castle grew as it neared, the boats heading straight for it, and Harry rubbed his eyes. He was tired and a bit pissed off- his head was also hurting more than he'd let on. He wanted to get this shit over with so he could find out where he'd be sleeping and collapse.

There was suddenly a little splash and the dumpy boy in his boat cried "Trevor!" and lurched, rocking the craft. Harry, in the back, happened to have decided he disliked the feeling of boats rocking. He put a hand on each side to steady himself, and counterbalance the boy as he leant over the side of the boat into the water.

"What's the matter?" the huge man called over.

"Trevor! He's jumped in the water!"

Harry lazily pointed his responding wand at the water and summoned the little toad onto the boat again. It splashed right up and onto the boy's lap.

The kid was shocked into silence- Harry realised nobody had seen him do that. _Probably for the best,_ he thought. Then he caught the eye of a small Asian girl sitting in the back of the next boat- she was looking at him expressionlessly. He ignored her.

"There," the giant called. "He's jumped back up now- you got him tight?"

"Er – yeah, I think so!"

"Hold on to him now. Watch out everyone- this' a low bridge!"

Harry ducked with the rest of them, avoiding the creeping foliage on the outcrop of rock.

A few minutes later and they were in some subterranean pier that looked a bit smooth to be natural. Harry stepped out, grateful for the solid earth beneath his feet again. He took some deep breaths, staring up and around the cavern.

"Come on, now, you lot! Up 'ere-"

The giant man led them up stone stairs, further and further, Harry getting tired more in his head than his legs until they reached the top of them and they all stood in front of the huge oak doors that must lead into the castle.

The big man disappeared- somehow- and the group was left there. Harry closed his eyes for a second. He could hear whispering in front of him, but not the subject. He found he didn't much care.

_Just one year,_ he said to himself. _This whole charade will calm down. Just a year._

Harry opened his eyes when the ghosts appeared, and he winced.

_This must be a dream. This is ridiculous._

Then the huge doors opened and Professor McGonagall stepped out.

* * *

_Lay low,_ he told himself. _Lay low, keep your head down and don't attract unwanted attention._

They were being led as one body up the centre aisle between four huge tables. Hermione was saying something about the ceiling and he didn't bother correcting her. The eyes of the entire school were on them all, and Harry realised that being the only one with his cloak's hood up was sure to attract attention.

He pushed the hood down, eyes on the floor, his beanie remaining firmly upon his head.

Before they reached the front Harry took the opportunity to surreptitiously regard all of his school-mates. His new colleagues. Most of them looked frighteningly normal- in fact, only a few stuck in his head- a pretty, older looking blonde girl he'd seen in Diagon Alley in the past days sitting at the far-left table, a shy looking black boy who held himself, despite not whispering in conversation to anyone else, in extraordinary grace at the second table along. Harry thought he might have learnt some form of Martial Art, and decided that he might pursue the opportunity for a sparring partner.

He didn't meet anyone's eyes as he continued up, in the heart of the crowd. He kept his face stony and impassive. He'd not taken his earring out and he was hoping nobody would notice- he wasn't exactly brushed up on his school rules.

He then saw the teachers at the high table. Their own eyes were breezing over their new students, every single expression varying from pride to disappointment to cheeriness to, in the case of the elderly man in the very centre on the high-backed throne, a gentle sadness.

_You must be Dumbledore,_ Harry thought. _I'll be seeing you later on._

The old Scottish Professor, McGonagall, brought from a side room an old, pointy leather hat on a stool and set it down on the dais at the head of the room.

"What the fuck is this?" Harry whispered to himself. Two Indian girls- twins- turned around to give him an identical shocked look. He closed his mouth, fighting a grin.

Ron, near him, openly smiled. But he was evidently also nervous- his arms were crossed and he had sweat on his forehead. Harry knew this hat must be the infamous Sorting Hat from Hogwarts: a History, but he'd expected something a little more… _grand._

Suddenly, causing Harry to frown, the Sorting Hat's ripped brim opened wide like a mouth, and in a croaky old voice it began to sing.

Harry wasn't listening to the words- he didn't much care for whatever a hat sang about. He took the opportunity to examine his classmates, standing around him. He already pretty much knew all there was to know about Ron- he suffered an underachiever complex that spawned from having a big, somewhat successful family. He was desperate to prove himself but lacked the capacity to.

Hermione stood nearly at the front of the crowd. He couldn't see her face but knew her eyes would be agleam in the face of a singing hat. She came from a non-magical world, just like Harry, but she'd evidently been somewhat sheltered. The difference between them was that she acted her age while thinking she was older.

It was hard to gleam anything else off first impressions when the people were this young- he thought he could sense another underachiever in that dumpy kid with the toad, but in a different way to Ron.

Draco Malfoy was simply a junior snob. An aristocrat that knew because his mummy and daddy thought they knew everything, so did he. He really _thought_ he was superior to everyone, as though social status means shit all to eleven year olds, but this superiority complex was again in a different way to Hermione.

The hat had stopped singing, he realised. As the Deputy Head started reciting names off a scroll, Harry rolled his eyes, thinking about how much he could absolutely slaughter a cigarette. _Maybe I'll visit the battlements afterwards,_ he thought. He smirked to himself. _I wonder what they'd say if they caught me smoking. Well, probably won't be as bad as when they catch me sword fighting._

Hermione was called up. She became a Gryffindor about a minute later. Harry began wondering what house he'd be in.

_What the hell qualities do I have?_ He thought. _Suppose it doesn't matter. I'll be out of this fantasy rip-off before they can tie me down. _Suddenly, he berated himself, thinking, _No. Wrong attitude. You're here to change your life, Shujin. To learn how to become better at the Art. Fuck all of these jokers- its all you._

Malfoy was called up, and in less than a heartbeat he was a Slytherin. Harry frowned. If he'd guessed correctly, he'd end up in there. The loner's house. The one to do with cunning. But then, was he giving himself more credit than was due?

_Will I end up sleeping in the same room as Malfoy?_

He shuddered.

Then the room went quiet. The soft, humming levels of general cheerfulness died out very quickly and there was a sudden tension. A few whispers arose.

"Harry – Potter..?" Professor McGonagall's voice said again, in question.

Harry took a deep breath and stepped forwards, through the crowd, until he stood in front of the Deputy. He took of his hat. The other teachers, he noticed, had all leaned forwards in their seats, and the old Headmaster was gaping like a fish.

Professor McGonagall recovered first, and said, "P – please take a seat, Mr. Potter."

He turned as he sat on the stool, the hat lowered onto his head, and the last things he heard of the outside world were sudden varying whispers erupting over the room and the deputy calling for quiet.

Then a voice said in his ear, "Well met, Mr. Potter. Or should I call you Shujin?"


	9. The Discourse, Pt I

_A very short chapter, for which I apologise. There was really nothing else to add to it though :( It was planned to be the end of book one but I added a few more chapters in too lol._

_I decided for once that in Unforgiven I would use chapter lengths that are _very_ short to me, as a little private experiment. I have decided I prefer 30-40 page chapters as opposed to 10-15, but I'm going to stick to this style until the end of this story. I now know! If this is ever re-written I may consider lengthening every chapter, but that's a long way off._

_I'm pleased to hear that people are enjoying the story, so thanks again for the reviews. A quick explanation about the name 'Shujin'- I used to think, because I'd been taught incorrectly and I'm a bad student, that Shujin was the Japanese phonetic translation of 'Harry'... the name also means, in Japanese, 'Lord' or 'Leader'. I know now this is incorrect, but the name stuck in my head when I was planning this story and I just like the was it sounds, so I thought I'll use a little artistic license to say that's why he's called that. As for how Mito Nobunaga knew his name was Harry... all will be revealed. There is far more to Harry's sensei than anyone anticipated._

_I apologise for my terrible Japanese._

_As for Harry's house... forgive me_ :P

_Enjoy, and stay cool GL_

* * *

Dumbledore hadn't breathed in a full minute. 

He sat forward, watching the boy on the stool- earring, shaved head, strong, wiry and scarred body… who was this boy? _This_ was Harry Potter?

_What has happened to you Harry?_ He thought. He felt so sad, so hollow, that putting Harry with the Dursleys caused the young boy to run away. He felt so strange that, instead of them finding _him…_ he'd come to them. He'd found _them_. He'd rejoined of his own free will.

If he hadn't seen the scar before he turned around, the Headmaster would not have believed it was him. This boy- this Harry Potter- had become a street urchin. _Merlin only knows what he's had to go through to survive,_ he thought, feeling horrendous.

Suddenly, the Sorting Hat said out loud, "Fortunately, Harry Potter, _you_ are not _me._"

_What does that mean?_ Dumbledore thought, but before he could think of anything else, the brim opened again and shouted out Harry Potter's school House for the whole room to hear.

* * *

_Harry Potter or Shujin? I don't care either way,_ he thought at it. 

"No," the hat said to Harry. "You don't seem to care for a lot but yourself."

_It's harder to care for others when others have never cared for you._

"People care for you here."

_Why do you think I'm here? Maybe I'm giving it a try._

"You are more than capable of putting others before you. Even if you don't want to, it's in your nature. You're parents were the same- both of them."

_I'm not my parents._

"I know that better than most."

There was silence for a while.

"Rarely do I get someone as challenging as you. I'm also vaguely insulted that you only half-intend to stay at Hogwarts for as long as you can."

_Going from freedom on the streets of London to a posh boarding school is more of a leap than others are having to make._

"This is true- if you call what you had 'freedom'. Tell me, if you can, Harry; why have you come to Hogwarts?"

_Because…_ now Harry had to stop and get his thoughts in order. _Lots of reasons I think. I want to better myself, yeah, but I also want to completely overhaul my shitty life. I'm sick of being- of being street-me. I need to… be acceptable, somewhere. I enjoyed Diagon Alley when I stayed there, not just because of money. It had a good, almost innocent atmosphere. I was hoping this place will be the same._

"You won't be anonymous here."

_I know. I want to get that whole part done with._

"You showed bravery in coming. And intelligence. Yet also cowardice and stupidity. Well done," it said wryly. "Yet you came for your own reasons. Hmm… well, let me rule out Hufflepuff."

_If you want._

"You don't want to be anyone's hero? Is that it?"

Harry winced.

_It's more… to do with wanting to _earn_ this title and reputation. I want to be known, and stronger, but not for something I did when I was one._

"Noble yet selfish. Very intriguing."

_I suppose._

Silence.

"I have to deliberate very long and hard over this. Let me ask you two things before I decide, my boy."

_Alright._

"What will the wizarding world do for you?"

_It – it'll help me find myself. Or, better yet, recreate myself entirely. I've – I've killed people - to survive... But – in this world, I can't imagine it being necessary. Does that make sense?_

"I think you'll be in for a disappointment. However, finally, let me ask this; what will _you_ do for the wizarding world?"

_I'll earn this reputation. I suppose I'll, in trying to recreate myself,_ try _to help others. Try to learn more things. I won't say no to assisting people- I already have had full conversations with people my own age, something which I hadn't done before- even if I enjoy my own privacy._

"If you truly want to change, tell the truth to me."

_Can't you see it in me?_

"You're confusing. Besides, I want to hear you say it."

_Well, I haven't thought much about it, but… I do. I want to change._

"What do you think of Slytherin?"

_Lots of wankers,_ he said to it frankly. _Probably mostly misunderstood. I expect I'll end up there- I'm pretty selfish._

"Like you say, misunderstood," the hat said, but Harry didn't know whether he was talking of the house or him. "What do you think of Ravenclaw?"

_Supposed to be the smart-people house. I wouldn't count myself as a genius or anything- I read a lot but I've never done magic before in an assessed situation._

"Interesting. What about Gryffindor?"

_What happened to the questions being over?_

"They will be soon. Answer me."

_Well- Ron thinks he'll go there. Hermione already did, and that Neville kid. Those are like the only people I've spoken to since I rejoined this world. I reckon I could keep in contact with them if I tried, but the inter-house thing is pretty deep, I see._

"Tell me what you think of the house."

_It's… well, they seem to be mostly brave. A little headstrong perhaps. I don't think many have ever had the chance to prove their bravery honestly- it's more of a textbook thing, probably. They think they're heroes more than they want to actually be them. I know that no matter where I go I won't avoid making enemies and friends to do with the houses._

There was a long pause. Harry looked around the room- everything had frozen. He couldn't hear or see anything different happening in the whole thing- nine of every ten eyes were on him.

_Well?_

"This will be the very last question. I promise."

_Ok._

"If you were me, where would you put you? Let's say I'm giving you the choice."

Harry frowned.

_Shit, _he thought. _I don't know. I can't honestly imagine myself fitting in properly anywhere in here. But- I suppose I'll try._ He peered around at the motionless house tables. _I think I'd – I wouldn't want Ravenclaw, I think, because that would put pressure on me to be something I'm not. A genius. Same with Gryffindor really- they'd expect me to be some amazing boy-who-lived Hero. I think I'd put me in Slytherin. If I were you._

After a very long pause, the Sorting Hat said to Harry very quietly, "Fortunately, Harry Potter, _you_ are not _me._"

* * *

The school waited with baited breath, nobody speaking at all. It had been two minutes at least- all eyes were on the hat. It had just mumbled something- the entire room was still.

"Gryffindor!" it announced suddenly, taking all by surprise.

For about 5 seconds, as Harry took the Hat off his head, feeling numb, there was absolute dead silence.

Then the cheering started.

Harry was nearly knocked back. The noise was absolutely deafening- nearly every member of Gryffindor was on their feet, cheering or clapping. He was surprised- he hadn't even done anything yet.

_But,_ he thought with a thrill, _if this is what it's like from reputation alone, wait til I become the strongest wizard known to man. Then they'll _really_ applaud me._

He moved to the table and sat down. His legs felt like jelly.

Professor McGonagall looked as though she didn't know what to think of this- her mouth was still gaping. She had to be prompted by the Headmaster, who was now beaming, to continue reading the names out.

Neville smiled at Harry in an odd, excited but embarrassed way, and Hermione patted Harry awkwardly on the shoulder until the cheering ended.

Eventually, Ron joined the house too, and he got nearly as loud a cheer from who Harry guessed were his older brothers alone.

He clapped politely, as he had for everyone, winking at Ron emotionlessly when he sat opposite him.

Ron's face was a cacophony of feelings- pride at being inducted into Gryffindor, wariness of Harry and a slightly awed berth, embarrassment at the fuss made over him, and something Harry would come to recognise as hunger.

The Headmaster rose when the last boy had been sorted into Slytherin and raised his hands. Everyone fell quiet, but Harry hadn't been talking anyway. Dumbledore gave a winning smile over all of his school and Harry fought back a scowl. _I have some serious questions that I need to ask that man,_ he thought.

"Welcome! Welcome, to a new year at Hogwarts! Only a few words for you all before you eat- Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you," he said, and sat down.

A lot of amusement and surprise and grateful moans were made when the food appeared. Laughter and chatter was soon accompanied by the sound of cutlery being used on the huge plates.

Harry's jaw actually dropped, for the first time, in awe.

_This is ridiculous,_ he thought. Instead of piling his plate up with food as his peers were, he awkwardly put just a few pieces of toast on his plate and he ate them slowly with his fingers.

"Not hungry, Harry?" asked the perceptive Hermione.

"How?" Ron asked incredulously, between mouthfuls. "I'm absolutely starving!"

Hermione gave him a look as he shovelled food into his mouth and turned slightly away. Neville, too, didn't look too hungry- he was staring at a full plate as though contemplating falling asleep in it.

Harry thought about what would happen if he said 'No, I'm not too hungry Hermione. Just one month ago, homeless and fighting for my life on the streets of London, I had to conjure my own food so I didn't starve,' but couldn't picture their reactions. He realised he didn't want to know- they'd probably think he was joking anyway.

He didn't say anything- he just nibbled his toast.

Dessert came and he ate nothing, just watched as the others did. Hermione had lemon meringue, Neville had cake and Ron had… a lot of things. Watching them eat made him feel sick. All he wanted was a fag.

Finally, the meal was over. The Head stood up and gave a number of pointless announcements that Harry paid no attention to, and before he knew it, the entire school was bellowing something. Harry thought they'd been dismissed, but eventually realised that they were actually all _singing_ the words the headmaster was making with his wand. He groaned.

And then the head dismissed them all with the announcement that term was starting the next day. The 2nd was a Monday, Harry thought, though he couldn't really remember.

He tried to catch the Headmaster's eye as he stood up, but the old man was talking to a dark-haired Professor who was staring into space. This man, too, seemed oddly familiar to Harry. He looked away before he drew attention and followed the first year's crowd to the leading prefects.

Up through the castle they went, across and over pointless moving staircases and getting stuck periodically in trick stairs. Neville gave a scream when a suit of armour wished him goodnight. Through corridors and hallways that Harry, despite living in alleys for the better part of 4 years, was sure he would not remember.

Eventually they came to a portrait and Harry, though he would later recall it subconsciously, didn't hear the password.

He reached his dormitory, tired and frustrated, ignoring his house-mates and going to the only bed without a trunk in front of it (because his own was in his pocket) to pull the curtains on it aside.

On his bed was a note, but he didn't notice it at first.

He got out his trunk, whispered 'Home' though he doubted his own word, and opened it at the combination 2-1-4-3. He undressed quickly and silently, putting his clothes into the spacious compartment and pulling out a night-robe which- after admiring his tattoo for a moment in the moonlight- he slipped on. He left his knife and sheath under his pillow and his wand-holster strapped to his arm.

He then closed the lid with a small thud and opened it at 3-2-1-4. Here was a bigger part of the trunk in which he kept his library- he reached in as far as possible and pulled out the book he'd been reading on Runic Engraving, and also the Standard Book of Spells, Grade 3.

Putting them on his bed as he closed his trunk, he noticed the note there.

Unfolding it he saw written in curly purple writing, '_Dear Harry, if you wouldn't mind, please meet me for a cup of tea in my office tomorrow afternoon as soon as your lessons finish. I'm most anxious to talk to you. Regards- Professor Dumbledore.'_

Harry smiled to himself.

_Way ahead of you, old man._

He skipped a cigarette this evening, knowing he'd no doubt need it tomorrow, and the last thing he did before going to bed for the night was step to the window and open it. He did this for two reasons- one, in case Mar wanted to rejoin him before dawn, and two, because he'd slept on rooftops for a long, long time, and the night air would forever remain more assuring company to him than other souls in the same room possibly could.

Harry Potter, new student of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, slept.


	10. The Discourse, Pt II

_Again, thank you for the reviews. I'm just rewriting the second volume at the moment, so there should be some fairly nice, steady updates from herein. I'm glad people are enjoying something about my story or even the story itself, and it's nice to hear anyone's thoughts on how I might better myself as a writer._

_My original plan, in case you're curious, was to make this the beginning of the second book, but that isn't for a little while yet now. I found a better and more conveniant place for it. I must apologise in advance though for the slow pace from hereon- lots of things needed to happen and very quickly, so the actual timeline passes very slowly for a while. I hope you can bear with it- that's one of the many problems with shorter chapters lol. It picks up in the second book._

_With regards to the question about the sorting hat conversation being a revelation of Harry- that's exactly what it was. That was a moment of realisation for Harry as much as it was for the reader. Whether Harry will stick to his new resolutions, however..._

_Thanks for reading, and Peace to y'all.. GL._

* * *

Harry woke quickly. He didn't know why, or even what time it was, but the sun was just rising. 

He pulled the 'Standard Book of Spells' towards him and had a breeze through it, not really absorbing anything new, while his mind followed his body into consciousness.

He sat up, uncomfortable after sleeping in such a plush bed, and got his trunk out of his bedside cabinet to change into his disastrous school robes.

Mar was nowhere to be seen- Harry hoped it was ok. He didn't need the bird as of yet, but it was the first live animal he'd ever been entrusted to keep, and he'd rather not have it die or run off on him.

He stretched, clicking his joints, and walked out of the bed-quarters to the common room he'd seen the night before. The fire's embers were smouldering slightly, half-heartedly, and he sat looking at them.

This made him want a cigarette.

He didn't know the way up to the battlements of this fortress, and doubted students were allowed up there anyway, so he went without this morning. Instead, contemplating fatalistically the coming day- the first school day he'd have had in a _long_ time- he found his way to the bathroom.

The clock told him it wasn't even quarter past six. Too early for anything. Even after a shower and his first ever proper groom- his hair, however short, had been filthy- it was too damned early.

_I'll need to sort out this waking-up,_ he thought. His dreams he couldn't remember- he had no reason to be awake.

The first thing he did was, remembering his jacket, upstairs in his trunk, that he'd probably never get to wear much anymore, he started to mod his school robes using his wand. He used _Condecomfus_ where he was comfortable expanding the space, tearing and neatening up pockets and compartments in his voluminous robes. He used _Adlevo_, a cushioning charm in Standard Book of Spells Grade 4, on the inside of it so the things he kept in there wouldn't dig into him. He also, finally, did his best with a more-advanced one called the 'Featherlight charm', pronounced _Minueronus!_

_This should be able to fit my school stuff- and my dagger- in comfortably without anyone noticing, _he thought_. Won't be a chore to carry either._

Upon finishing that he decided to go for a walk- it would no doubt take him long enough to find the Great Hall, he reasoned. He got his things together and pushed out of the portrait door to the tower, wandering off into the castle.

* * *

With his newfound, rudimentary knowledge of the place, he was comfortable enough in his navigation to find the rooms he'd need. 

He'd visited the Transfiguration rooms, the Defence corridor and the hospital wing. He'd also found the doors to the library, though they didn't open until seven.

He was also, by now, bored out of his skull.

_One year of this,_ he thought grimly, wanting nothing more than to simply walk out the front doors and find a city.

He was walking down the stairs to the Entrance Hall when he saw another student, finally, reminding him that the castle in fact was _not_ dead.

It was the athletic-looking black boy he'd noticed in the hall the night before. He was wearing his school clothes, like Harry, reading the announcements board.

_Do I approach him?_ Harry wondered. He was really not very good at this- how do you initiate socialisation with another student? Did he even actually want to?

Before he could decide anything, however, he was at the bottom of the stairs.

The boy looked around, turning with a fluid movement to meet Harry's eyes. He had a cool, dark gaze that was stony solid, not giving away the slightest emotion.

Harry had a vague idea about earning respect from people- find something that they can admire in you. He schooled his face to not show the slightest bit of what he was feeling- he merely nodded at the boy.

To his surprise, the boy grinned at him.

"You're up early, Harry Potter," he said, his smooth young voice carrying over the hallway.

"Yes," Harry said, pausing in his tracks. What to say?

"Trouble sleeping?" the boy asked him.

"Not used to the setting, I suppose."

The boy nodded. Suddenly, he strode to where Harry was with just a few steps. He towered over him.

"Ali, third year Ravenclaw," the boy said, extending a hand.

Harry gripped it firmly. He didn't give his own name- the kid knew it already.

"Why are _you_ up so early?" he asked him.

Ali shrugged, saying, "Not a very good sleeper. Things on my mind."

Harry nodded.

"A little trouble at home, too," Ali said suddenly, giving Harry a very strange, unreadable look.

"Oh, right," Harry said, looking down.

"I do exercises in the morning to take my mind off it."

Harry seized his chance. He asked, "You do any fighting sports?"

The boy grinned suddenly, feral.

"Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu."

"Ah," Harry said. It was one of the few he'd never had any experience with. "I do some Muay Thai, some Kung Fu."

"Look at you," the boy said in a strange way. Harry thought he might be taking the piss- he longed for the comfortable weight of his sword.

"I don't suppose I could occasionally exercise with you in the morning?" Harry asked him. "If I can't sleep."

"Oh," said the boy, staring over his head at something non-existent, "I doubt you'd keep up. You can try if you like."

With that, he strode into the Great Hall without a backwards glance.

Harry stared after him. He was rarely so unsure of someone after a full conversation, but this boy- Ali- was a total enigma. Did he know Harry from somewhere? He felt somehow unnerved- he'd never encountered Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, in any form, but he knew like a sixth sense that this boy Ali could kill him if he wanted, despite his training.

That aside, he also felt that this boy thought Harry had wronged him in some strange, unknown way. Had he been accidentally rude to him? _Why do I even fucking care?_ Harry thought furiously.

And should he go out and spar with him tomorrow morning?

Harry shook his head, confused but not about to dwell on it, and walked into the Great Hall. It was vastly empty with so few people in it- the school population filled it up in more than just body mass- and Harry was shocked at how hollow it looked. _Maybe that strange kid just knocked my confidence or something,_ Harry wondered, unused to not being totally and utterly sure of his own self. _People on the street are so much more straightforward- they either got along with and did business with me, or they got themselves hurt._

He shook his head, seeing Ali sitting eating at the Ravenclaws' table with only a few other people on it with his back to him, and head over to his own Gryffindor table. As he sat down at it, the dishes near him filled with different types of food.

He shook his head in bewilderment, helping himself to eggs and toast but not much else, deciding to feed himself up for the day.

A very odd thing happened when he poured out some strange orange-coloured juice into his goblet- he got a very strange buzzing sensation in his ears. His chest grew hot… then Harry realised it wasn't his chest itself, but the amulet he had hanging there. He put down the jug, leaning forwards to get the hanging metal to swing away from his chest, and as soon as he did so the buzzing stopped.

He lifted the collar of his shirt away slightly, peering down at the eye-shaped wrought silver, confused. _Do magical things malfunction?_

He knew he'd have to research it before we went to lessons, but left it on for the moment, shaking his head. He looked around him- no teachers around yet, and none of the students had noticed anything odd.

He reached for his now-full goblet again and the bloody thing started heating up, buzzing in his ears again.

"For _fuck's sake_," he whispered to himself, taking a bite of toast with one hand and undoing the clasp on the back of the rope of the amulet. Chewing, he reached in between his shirt buttons and pulled the amulet out. He put it in one of his un-enchanted pockets, shaking his head.

Out of the corner of his eye he noticed someone heading up the Gryffindor table, briskly, and raised his eyes to meet those of Professor McGonagall's.

"Good Morning, Mr. Potter," she greeted him formally.

"Bright and early yourself, Professor," he said.

She eyed him, but just handed him a sheet of paper.

"Your timetable," she told him. "I'd advise you to be prompt."

"Right," he said absently, staring at it. "Cheers."

"Quite," she said with an unhidden frown before moving onto the few other Gryffindor early-risers.

His first lesson was Herbology. He assumed, by 'GrnHs 6' in the corner of the square that this meant the 6th greenhouse. He tried to remember seeing any the night before and couldn't. He frowned to himself. He couldn't guess the time, even looking up at the sunlit sky pouring in through the enchanted ceiling, so decided maybe he'd best leave now to try and discover his first ever magical classroom.

He didn't catch Ali- or anyone else- looking at him.

* * *

"You had any experience with plants, Harry?" the Professor called Sprout asked him. 

"Did some gardening when I was younger," he told her. "Not really though, no."

"Well," she said with a grunt as she heaved the heavy glass door open, "at least you're enthusiastic. Tending and caring for plants is an exact art- especially with magical plants. More often than not if you treat a magical plant bad it'll treat you even worse."

He smiled slightly. He was early, as he knew he would be, and the Professor had shown up just now after about 20 minutes to prepare the classroom.

"Some people here'll treat you a bit strange, Harry," she said slowly. "Something you'll have to get used to. Me- I don't care where you've been, what you've done, what you look like- if you perform well in my class, work hard, you'll go far."

"Ok," he said, face impassive.

"You done any pre-reading for this class?"

"Yes," he said.

She pointed at a plant in the corner. "What's that one called?" she asked.

Harry looked, and said, "It looks like a sort of _Limibus Tobola_, but that would be a guess. Commonly called Red-Hood or something like it. Used in cosmetic potions."

She looked at him, mouth hanging open.

"Indeed," she said quietly. "It's Red-Hood of the _Tilmumni_ family, not _Tobola_, but other than that, spot on. Well done, Harry- most _second_ years couldn't tell me that."

He was surprised but didn't show it- that one was easy. About 4 pages into the set reading.

"What colour is Gimbleroot?" she asked him.

"Depends what kind," he said, brain answering for him. "Common Gimbleroot is a dark blue; the Irish variety is…" he fought to remember. "Just a lighter blue, I think."

She shook her head, saying, "That _is_ impressive. That one isn't in your set reading, _1000 Magical Herbs and Fungi_."

"I think it was in Spore's other one, _Truncus_ something."

She nodded. "That it was," she said, staring at him.

_If it's this easy to impress my teachers, I'll need to slow down. I don't want them thinking I'm too experienced,_ he thought.

Then that Hermione girl walked in. She seemed in extraordinarily good spirits.

"Morning Harry!" she said brightly. She spotted her teacher suddenly and gave a reverent half-bow. "Professor Sprout!"

Sprout laughed at her and wished her Good Morning back, and told them to take a seat.

Harry did, Hermione sitting near but not next to him, and pulled from his pockets his Herbology equipment, not really believing that he was sitting down a school day for the first time in four years.

As expected, with his memorised magical herb and fungi knowledge he was pretty much top of that class, to Hermione's chagrin. He felt strange, outsmarting peers- some of whom were raised by wizards, in wizard homes- but didn't let it slow him down.

History of Magic was an absolute drag. Harry made a mental note to bring one of his own books to read in these lessons from now on- all they were was lectures on ancient rebellions and treaties that were already in his History of Magic book. If he simply read and remembered that, he'd get through any exams with no problems, he knew.

_Waste of an hour,_ Harry grumbled in his head, but he didn't want to upset a teacher- even a ghost- this early in his education so he kept it to himself.

After lunch- in which he didn't eat or drink anything, just put back in his trunk the things he'd already used today- he had charms. As it turned out, Harry wasn't very good at charms. For all his reading, he had an absolutely terrible memory for incantations- Hermione had to correct him twice on how exactly you pronounced the spell they were practising, and she wasn't even sitting next to him. He was alright at the theory side of it, and he had no trouble making things happen to the subject, the only problem was that it was rarely what he actually wanted _to_ happen.

In the end of it he shocked the quarter of the class within hearing distance with a vicious swearword and by throwing his wand on the desk. Again, those two Indian twins- who despite being in different houses shared this class together- turned around and looked at him reproachfully.

As soon as he'd felt such furious frustration, his feather had managed to do exactly what he wanted it to. He debated whether or not to calm himself down.

Double Transfiguration was his last class of the day. He was off to a dodgy start in terms of teacher-student relationship by getting a dressing down by McGonagall for wearing an earring to class. He'd set his jaw and said nothing, taking it out without fuss, deciding to be diplomatic. He redeemed himself however- He happened to be better at this, where the stress was less on remembering the right words and more on genuine magic/will power. He got his matchstick to turn into a needle and back again and was the only person in the class to have earned 20 points for Gryffindor from the shell-shocked McGonagall.

Walking from that room at the end of the day by himself, tucking his school things into his robes, he suddenly remembered his meeting with the headmaster.

He froze on the spot.

_Shall I go..?_

He entertained the thought of leaving the old man waiting for him, and doing things on his own terms, but knew he couldn't risk that just yet. Who knew? The man could be civil to him- could offer a very valid explanation as to why he had Harry left on a doorstep ten years ago.

Harry snorted, somehow doubting it.

He walked back into the classroom, about to ask McGonagall for directions, but she was nowhere to be seen.

"Right," Harry said to himself viciously. "_Magic_. Very entertaining."

As he walked out he thought, _What, so I'm supposed to wander around with no idea where the office is that I'm supposed to go, is that it?_

If that was the case, money be damned, Harry would risk expulsion by simply telling the old bastard what he thought of him.

He stalked down the corridor.

* * *

"Who's there?" a voice asked. 

Harry sighed. He'd been walking for ten minutes with no idea where the Head's office, or even the staffroom, was. He backtracked to the turning he'd just passed and looked down it.

Two twins stared back at him, looking exceptionally guilty. One squinted at him.

"Who's that then?"

Harry debated whether to just walk on or not. He sighed again, and waved his hand.

The twins moved forward casually, slowly, and Harry saw they had bright red hair.

"Ah- Harry Potter, right?"

"Yes," Harry said. "Are you related to Ron?"

"You're friends with our beloved brother!" one said.

"Why didn't you say so?" said the other.

"He's Fred-"

"And I'm George-"

"Weasley," they finished together.

"Entertaining," Harry said, pissed off. "I don't suppose either of you know where the Head's office is?"

"Ooh," said Fred. "The famous Harry Potter in trouble on his first day?"

"That's… very impressive," George said, and Fred agreed.

"Cheers," Harry said impatiently, "Do you know where the old man's office is?"

They both grinned beatifically at him.

"If we didn't know," said one.

"It would imply that we'd never been sent there," said the other.

"And that would mean…"

"We weren't working hard enough."

"This way," they both said, and began to walk the way Harry had come from. Harry noticed them sticking something into their pockets.

He followed them, speeding up after them, saying, "It's this way? To the Head's office?"

"It's a shortcut, mate," George said.

Harry winced. He didn't want to stab two idiots on his first day- not when he was about to meet the Headmaster.

After a few moments of walking, Fred swept aside a wall tapestry with a flourish, and George pointed through into a hidden corridor.

"Follow it to the end, turn left when you reach the hallway, follow the stairs and go the statue at the end of the corridor in the alcove. That's the Head's office."

"You aren't coming too?" Harry asked them.

"Afraid not, Master Potter- we're on a little business at present in another part of the castle."

"It would be unwise to show our faces near the Head's office at this point in time."

"So here we say," one said.

"Farewell!" they waved, then about turned and walked away.

Harry watched them go. He lifted the tapestry away, unsure and very unwilling to follow this strange passageway into the darkness. The two of them seemed like pranksters- while not openly hostile, they no doubt would love to get him hopelessly lost and in further trouble with Professor Dumbledore.

He ground his teeth.

Flicking his wand out, he cast the enlightenment charm, _Lumos!_ And it failed the first two times. Growing irritated even more, eventually he succeeded with a faint light.

The passage didn't go on very long, he could see that even in his meagre wandlight, but still he was hesitant. _Trust them? Psh, when have I ever put my safety in someone else's hands?_

He pushed the tapestry back into place, stepped back, and turned around to come face to face with a very ugly old man.

"Oho, _someone_'s in trouble, aren't they my sweet?"

* * *

Albus Dumbledore sat as his desk, glancing at the clock. 

It was now half an hour since the lessons of the day ended.

_I am a fool,_ he thought sullenly. He'd sent the note to Harry very deliberately without instructions or directions to get to his office, to see what the boy would do. It was a sort of test. The more seconds ticked by, the more foolish he felt, unable to think why he might have done it.

_What if he now simply doesn't come at all?_ He thought. _Oh, Albus, you dolt. This was not the right way to begin some sort of trust between Harry and you._

He had a lot of things to ask the boy, and a lot more things to consider about him, and seconds were ticking away. He couldn't justifiably keep the boy into his dinner-time.

Suddenly, outside his office door where the staircase would be, he heard the sounds of a scuffle. A very audible young voice broke out.

"Get your _damned_ hands off me. I'm not a _fucking_ fugitive, you stupid old cunt. Let – fucking – _go_-"

The door banged open. Harry Potter stood in the doorway, looking extremely angry. Argus Filch bustled in after him, protesting at the top of his lungs. Albus didn't know whether to feel shocked, relieved, or… anything at all.

"This little rascal I caught sneaking around, doing magic in the corridors! He attacked me, the little brute! He swore at me- the little ratty urchin, I'll slaughter 'im!"

Harry didn't say anything- in fact, in a transition lasting less than a second, he went from looking utterly furious to a totally blank mask, breathing shallower and calming himself visibly down.

Albus, impressed as he was, stood and held his hands up to stall his caretaker's tirade.

"Little bastard! Then he – he – oh," Filch said, face crumpling in front of the headmaster, "He said he was looking for you but he wouldn't come quietly! Please, let me punish him! Please-"

"Enough, Argus. Thank you for escorting Harry here. I shall deal with him now."

"But you haven't heard everything! You didn't hear what he said…"

"I heard plenty. _Thank you_, Argus," Dumbledore said, pointing at the door.

Argus Filch turned, no doubt glaring horrifically at the now impassive Harry, who didn't even flinch. In a few seconds the door had closed behind the caretaker.

A few seconds of peace passed slowly. Albus sat down again, straightening his robes, not yet looking at Harry. As he fussed, he spoke.

"That was quite an impressive feat, Harry. Never have I seen our resident caretaker so furious, and considering he's outlasted the Marauders _and_ the young Weasley Twins, I have no doubt it wasn't easy."

Harry Potter, regarding him indifferently, said nothing.

Albus smiled at him benignly.

"I shan't punish you, Harry, since I do not doubt you were merely looking for my office, but I'd try to avoid running into Mr. Filch again."

Albus expected this to raise some reaction from the boy, some sign of emotion or maybe an angry remark about how that wouldn't have been necessary if he'd had directions to the office, but he didn't even move.

Still smiling, trying not to force it, Dumbledore said, "Please sit, Harry. Make yourself comfortable. I can't bear the formality of standing."

"Some people are comfortable standing, Headmaster," Harry Potter finally said, though he sat in the proffered seat.

_Clever,_ Dumbledore thought. _Slightly recalcitrant in his response, but because he sat there's nothing I can say._

"True," he said. "As you can imagine Harry, there are a number of things I'd love to ask you, though I'll only manage a few before your dinner time."

"Ditto, Headmaster. If you're as forthcoming in your answers as I hope you'll be, I won't lie to you once."

The headmaster nearly grinned at the balls on young Harry Potter.

"Really? Well, before we begin, may I offer you a drink?"

Harry Potter didn't appear to be considering, though Dumbledore knew he was. _If he's as intelligent as he thinks he is he'll know it's diplomatic to accept a drink,_ Dumbledore thought. He was right.

"I'll have what you're having, headmaster, thanks."

Dumbledore pulled from his desk draw a magically-heated teapot full of Earl Grey and poured two cups. He knew the potion in it was safe to drink for him- he was an of-age wizard.

He gave a cup to Harry, conjuring sugar and biscuits next to it, and sat back, taking a long sip.

Harry didn't touch his at first- perhaps waiting for it to cool? To see if it had any effects on the headmaster? But he was clearly waiting for Dumbledore to begin.

"Well, Harry, with regards to your questions, I will answer what I can."

"Likewise, Professor."

Dumbledore smiled again, though it _was_ slightly forced this time.

"Harry, please tell me as much as you can about where you've been since you left your relatives' house."

"London."

"Who looked after you?"

"I believe it's my question, now, Headmaster."

Dumbledore paused, then nodded and spread his hands.

Harry asked him, "Why was I left with the Dursley's when I was a year old?"

"They were you last surviving relatives, Harry," the Head said with a practised sadness. "Who looked after you in London?"

"I did, Professor. I assume-"

"Harry," Dumbledore interrupted, "I apologise, but I must ask for fuller answers if I am to repay with the same courtesy."

Harry considered and nodded.

"Alright- I lived in London, going straight there from the Dursley house and straight here from there, and I stayed on my own."

"With no money?"

Harry ignored his question and asked, "I assume you'll tell me that not having anyone know the location of me and my relatives was to keep me safe? Right," he continued, "so why was I attacked and nearly killed when I was seven at the dentist's surgery?"

Dumbledore was shocked. "You remember that, Harry?" he asked.

"Please answer."

"The young man who attacked you, I'm not sure if you remember him exactly, was called Bartemius Crouch Junior, and his father held an important position in the Ministry. The world thought that the politician's son was in Azkaban and had died there, and exact details are still unspecific, but apparently he broke out a long time ago. He used his father's information to find out about your last surviving relatives."

"Ok," Harry said, eyes closed. "What were you going to ask?"

"I've changed my question," Dumbledore said with a smile. "I've heard roughly why from your relatives, but may I hear your story of why you ran away? Something about an accident at school?"

"If you really spoke to my relatives," Harry said, his face finally betraying a flicker of emotion, "You'll understand why I thought that I'd prefer living as a homeless, penniless drifter rather than with a non-magical family who hated me, beat me regularly and, instead of explaining that the weird things I did- including to save their lives- were _magic_, simply locked me in a cupboard and called me a freak."

Dumbledore was momentarily speechless. _He must be exaggerating._

"Apart," Harry said, "from the woman who died at the dentist's, I never saw a single magical person while living with my _relatives._ Why?"

"I wanted to shield you from being the celebrity- from being _the Harry Potter-_ for as long as possible. I wanted you to experience a normal childhood."

Harry gave him a look that was full of suppressed loathing. "You didn't check up on me and my magic-hating relatives once- did you not think-"

"Harry," Dumbledore said gently. "It's my question." The boy was emotionless again. "I assume you got your letter, and that is why you're here. How are you enjoying Hogwarts?"

The question clearly took the boy by surprise.

"What?

"How are you enjoying the school? Did you feel you made the right decision in coming?"

"Er – well, so far, I don't know," Harry said with a frown. "It's alright. Very different to what I'm used to. I'm managing well enough although it is only my first day- I could hate the rest of it."

"True," the headmaster said.

"I suppose I'll stay for a bit. Being honest, there wasn't much decision in coming- it was either come here, or go to jail."

Headmaster Dumbledore suddenly sat up straighter.

Before he could say anything, Harry continued, "Now, Headmaster, I have just two more questions." He reached for his cup of tea finally, but slowly, relaxed. "Why did the Dark Lord Voldemort _failing_ to kill me give you the rights over my _entire_ life and bank acc- _ARGH"_

The Headmaster was shocked at the directness and bluntness of this question, but was saved an answer by the second shock- Harry Potter suddenly pausing, cup halfway to his mouth, arm frozen in place with a grimace of pain on his features.

"_Shit_," the boy breathed.

"Harry?" the Head asked quickly, very concerned at the pain across his charge's normally expressionless face.

Harry pushed his cup away from his face slowly- relief in his eyes- but suddenly there was another look there- Confusion… Suspicion… Fury…?

He was looking at his teacup.

The Headmaster's stomach fell.

Harry tried bringing the teacup to his face again and stopped short once more, groaning in pain, and the Headmaster stood up.

"Harry, what's the matter? Is it your arm?"

"God," Harry replied through clenched teeth. "I hope so."

He put the cup down on the desk where it had been, his arm fell, and he breathed easily, relieved, no longer feeling anything. The Headmaster narrowed his eyes.

Before anything else was said, Harry reached for the cup with his left hand. He was fine until he touched it- he was feeling a burn or something, but breathed out his full cheeks, fighting the pain in front of Dumbledore's eyes.

He pulled the cup closer to his face, and gasped in pain. The very distinctive sound of _tearing_ could be heard.

Harry's eyes were wide as he pulled it closer still. His arm locked in place, more ripping was heard, then a pause again, him breathing deeply.

Albus Dumbledore was horrified. _What is going on? Should I stun him? _He'd never seen anything like it.

Eyes bulging, the cup reached a point barely inches in front of his face. He couldn't take the feeling, whatever it was, any more. He dropped the cup. Tension fled for a moment.

As the cup fell, so did Harry's arm. He slumped backwards, tea spilled all over his robes, breathing as though he'd run a race. His eyes were closed. The sound had stopped.

"Harry, I demand to know what the matter is," Dumbledore said quietly.

Harry opened his eyes, looking at the Headmaster, and with a set jaw he rose in his chair. The teacup tumbled off him, smashing on the floor.

"I could – ask – you," he said, panting, "The – _same – question._"

Without another word he raised his hands to his buttoned school shirt, and ripped every button off with a single pull of both sides, them popping and flying everywhere. Albus Dumbledore was so astonished at this behaviour he fell back into his seat.

"A few days ago," Harry said, radiating anger, "I got a magical tattoo. It was a Dragon- a large, red dragon on my _right shoulder_, designed and enchanted to protect me from deception. To ward me from things that would _harm_ me."

His shirt was undone, and in a single move, he dropped his shirt, blazer, robes and top-half's clothes onto the chair behind him. His too-thin, wiry, strong young body was exposed.

His red dragon, framed with a fiery tribal wreath, now emblazoned his left shoulder instead of his right.

"My dragon definitely didn't want me to drink that tea, so tell me, _Honoured Headmaster Dumbledore,_ what in the name of FUCK were you trying to _drug_ me with?"


	11. The Belly's Fumes

_Thanks for the reviews- there are some brilliantly mixed opinions... makes the lizard grin_ D

_The only responses I really have time for are regarding questions raised about Harry himself... for instance, someone mentioned his arrogance- he is 'supposed to be intimidating but the image of an 11 yr old with a trench-coat, chain-smoking,' etc, despite that image not being intimidating in the slightest. How many children are half as tough, intimidating, clever or mature as they actually think they are? This is mostly a Harry's POV story, something I rarely do, so it'll be to Harry's point of view. If you disbelieve the image of a chain-smoking, ragged-clothed, earringed, lippy, violent, homeless and sociopathic eleven year old then this story isn't for you... and you've also obviously never spent a day in Lewisham._

_Aha, speaking of which, please don't lecture an Englishman on believable language. I **am** English, and being English I have been made aware constantly since the 80s of the- ironic- Americanisation of our language. Yes, Brits say 'Bollocks' and 'Bloody', but not every Brit is Hugh Grant (thank all saints and martyrs). Most use Americanised slang (for the sake of arguement- I won't go into word origins at the moment), and the patterns of speech being realistic are something I pride myself on, as one who has studied languages. If you listen to a conversation between two such real characters, and transcribe it verbatim onto paper, you'd find it a lot more difficult to understand than my feeble translations. I apologise if you find the language of some of the characters rather coarse, but this is merely to create a more believable atmosphere. He may not be as rough as he thinks he is, but he's still pretty rough and so are some of the people he meets. _

_Enjoy and Peace, GL._

_P.S. Please forgive me for Mar. It was pivotal to the plot._

* * *

Dumbledore gaped. 

So many things ran through his head- _where did he get a tattoo? How is it enchanted like that? Why was it so averse to the potion? How in the name of Merlin do I react to this?_

What he said was, "Harry… I – I don't understand-"

"Tell me what you put in that drink," the boy demanded, seething.

"Nothing- there was nothing wro-"

"Don't lie to me."

Dumbledore said nothing. He was in shock.

Harry said no more either- he simply grabbed his clothes and-to Dumbledore's wordless surprise- wandlessy flicked them onto himself and mended the shirt with a sweep of his hand.

As Harry marched out, Dumbledore collapsed into his chair, wondering how Harry Potter could have wriggled so free of his grasp.

* * *

Harry got to his dormitory as the bell rang for dinner. Some of his peers said things to him but he ignored them, simply collapsing on his bed. 

_What the hell was he trying to drug me with? Or am I over-reacting- was there nothing in the cup?_

But he trusted himself too much to believe that. His distinguished headmaster had been trying to drug him. With what, he couldn't even guess. _A truth serum?_

He opened the window with a bang, still furious, and swept his trunk up onto his bed. Opening it with the combination 1-2-3-4, his quickest and easiest, in which he kept his vitals, he lifted the lid, pulled out his multi-pack of cigarettes and extracted a 20-pack. He flicked the bottom, hands shaking, after ripping off the packaging.

Reclining into the window seat of the first-year dormitory Harry Potter lit his cigarette with the end of his wand, inhaled, and blew out, forcing himself to relax.

Then he noticed Ron.

The redhead was watching him warily from the doorway. Harry regarded him coldly.

"You know what this is?" he demanded suddenly, holding up the lit, lightly smoking fag.

Ron shook his head, eyes wide.

"This is the last legal connection I have to the streets of muggle London. To a world I thought it would be a good idea to leave behind."

Ron visibly gulped. "What do you mean?" he asked quietly.

"The – the deceit," Harry said, fighting for the words, "in this place, in the so-called school, is worse than most of the criminal rings of London."

"London?"

"For four years," Harry said, suddenly very, very tired. "Four fucking years."

"Why?"

"Because," Harry said through gritted teeth, "our beloved headmaster saw fit, in all his wisdom, to leave me on the doorstep of my _darling_ relatives. I did what any kid in the situation would do. I ran the fuck out."

Harry had the overwhelming urge to cry. Or scream. He shook his head. Even homeless, he's never felt so lost.

"I wish I'd never been born with magic."

Ron gasped, saying, "How can you say that!?"

"How can I say that, Ron?" Harry laughed mirthlessly. "Because if I hadn't had magic, I would have been killed by my uncle. I wouldn't have healed. If I didn't have my magic, my 'Art', I wouldn't have been beaten by him in the first place. Who knows? Maybe if I hadn't had magic Voldemort wouldn't have come after me."

Ron gasped hugely. He seemed more terrified of Harry than he could ever remember.

After a few moments, Harry staring out the window, Ron, who he'd thought had gone, said, "But you killed him."

"No, Ron," Harry said, feeling wretched. "I'm not some incredible Hero. I didn't kill Voldemort, he killed himself. All I did – all I did was get a scar."

Ron stood there, looking as though he wanted to cry.

"I'm sorry – sorry I said all this, Ron," Harry said, feeling shamed suddenly, unused to apologies. "I – I'll be alright in a bit. I just – I just want to leave here. I miss what I know, and I don't know magic."

"You're like the best in the class, though," Ron said, genuinely confused, reminding Harry of how simple the boy was.

"I read. I remember. There's little else to do when you're..." he swallowed. He choked silently. _On your own?_

Harry began to cry then, body-wracking sobs, and didn't remember Ron leaving.

* * *

He awoke later the next day, having read with wandlight on through most of the night. He wondered if he was late for lessons, and found he didn't actually care. 

Putting on his robes and filling the pockets with the things he'd need, he stood and stretched. He saw Neville still asleep in his bed and debated on whether he should wake him or not. He decided it wasn't his place, and strode out.

The common room was full of people- the first time Harry had seen it so- and they didn't look like they'd been out for lessons, or even breakfast, yet. Harry walked through the portrait hole and down the stairs, deep in thought, and eventually reached the Entrance Hall. The doors were open- he stared out into the grounds of the castle, fed up, seriously considering leaving.

_Just walk out. Just leave._

He knew it was impractical and that at least with his belongings upstairs he couldn't, but it was a nice thought anyway. _Any time I need to leave, they can't stop me._

He saw, down a long way onto the grounds, a black boy practising forms. He knew he wouldn't be joining Ali today.

"Harry," an old voice said behind him.

He turned to find Dumbledore standing there, majestic robes on him, looking mournful.

"Yes?" he answered, weary.

"I'd like to apologise. For – for trying to deceive you, last night. It was wrong."

Harry looked at him, his face like a statue. He didn't believe a single word. _This guy must be desperate for something..._

"Just so you know," Dumbledore continued. "It isn't just you. At the beginning and end of every year, every single student is given a potion. I can't tell you what it is, but it _is_ for their own safety. You have my word that, it being past the first day of term, it is no longer in any of the drinks."

"Your word?" Harry asked, too tired to be properly amused.

"Yes, Harry," Dumbledore said. "Just in case you were going to miss breakfast as well as dinner."

Harry shook his head. As he brushed past Dumbledore, heading towards the stairs again, he said, "I've never had much of an appetite anyway."

* * *

The library didn't disappoint him at least. 

It was filled with books, old and new, most of them huge and bound with leather. He had no doubt he could get them on every subject he liked in here, but didn't bother going past the potions section this morning. Double Potions was his first lesson of the day.

As he brushed up on rudimentary potions before the first class, ignoring his hunger pangs, he was aware of a few people nearby whispering. He didn't even want to know whether it was about him, and found himself wishing it wasn't.

When he looked up, a cow-eyed girl was whispering behind her hand to a friend, looking at him directly, and when their eyes met she jumped and scurried off.

Harry shook his head.

The bell went and he wandered down to the dungeons.

* * *

Every class he'd had so far had been silent at the beginning- they were just first years, and new to the classes and the teachers- but no silence had thus far been as uneasy as the one in the Potions classroom. 

Snape, tall and dark with long robes that flowed up behind him as he walked, had let them in and a few people actually jumped as the door slammed behind him.

Harry rolled his eyes, sitting at a desk in the middle next to the dumpy kid, Neville. _Aha, _Harry thought as he stared at Neville. _Ollivander's. That's where I know you from._

Professor Snape turned his dark eyes on the whole class, taking in everyone in turn but breezing over Harry as though he didn't exist. He leant over his register and began calling out the names in alphabetical order in a cold, precise voice. Everyone was present. He got to Harry's name.

"Ah yes," he said quietly. "Mr. Potter. Our new _celebrity_."

Harry frowned at him. He didn't say anything but something about this wizard made him uneasy… he also felt strangely as though he'd met him before somewhere…

Snape finished the register with no more remarks, though Harry caught Malfoy smirking over at him and returned his gaze with a face devoid of emotion. Malfoy eventually looked away.

"You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion making," Snape began. "Due to the lack of foolish wand-waving here, many of you will no doubt think this is not proper magic. I don't expect you to actually appreciate the beauty of a softly simmering cauldron, the delicate power of liquids as they creep through the human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses… I can teach you how to brew fame, bottle glory and even put a stopper in death. That is, if you aren't as big a group of dunderheads as I usually have to teach."

_Pretentious twat,_ Harry thought. Hermione, sitting next to a Slytherin girl, was on the edge of her seat. _Why do I have a bad feeling about this?_

"Potter," Snape said suddenly. Harry looked up slowly.

"Yeah?"

"Yes _sir._"

Harry didn't say anything. Snape's eyes bulged, and he quickly said, "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

Harry considered. He was frowning to himself.

"A sleeping draught," he said, unsure.

Snape looked slightly surprised, but quickly hid it, saying, "_The_ sleeping draught, Potter; The Draught of Living Death. Where would you look if I told you to find a bezoar?"

Harry didn't know this one. Snape's looming aggression he found a distraction.

"No idea," he said with a shrug.

"Tut, tut – fame clearly isn't everything, is it, Potter?"

"I wouldn't know, Professor, but I'll bear that in mind for my next general knowledge test," Harry said shortly. "Ask me another one then."

Snape looked angrier- he'd gone paler than usual- and said through gritted teeth, "Wha - you - What's the difference, then, Potter, between Monkshood and Wolfsbane?"

Harry laughed slightly to himself.

"They're the same plant, just different parts of the tree. That's easy."

"_Easy_, is it, Potter? So I suppose you think you're a know-it-all, now, hmm? Master Wizard Harry Potter, because the papers said so? Know everything to know about waving around your magic wand?"

Harry clenched his jaw, and said, "Even if I did, according to you my wand has nothing to do with Potions, so that's irrelevant. And yes, I did find that question simple, _Professor_ Snape. Ask me another one."

"Impertinent little – five points from Gryffindor for your cheek, Potter!"

Harry frowned, and said, "Alright. But I fail to see how my getting an answer right in your classroom should make me lose points. Doesn't that detriment your teaching methods? Not exactly a huge spur for people to answer you correctly, or pay you any attention at all, is it? Ask me another-"

"_OUT,_" Snape's voice echoed in the stone classroom. There was an angry red splotch high on each cheekbone. Harry sighed- _If looks could kill_, he thought,_ I'd be slightly tickled._

Harry shrugged, and picked up his unopened bag. If this guy was going to make a fool out of himself like this, losing the respect of his class before he'd even started, there was no point being there anyway.

He neared the door, feeling eyes on the back of his head, when suddenly his mind clicked.

He turned at the door, saying, "A goat."

Snape stared at him, almost shaking with rage.

"What did you just say?"

"I said, 'A goat'. That's where the bezoar comes from: The innards of a goat. I just remembered."

He turned and left.

* * *

_What a fucking cunt,_ Harry thought viciously as he was walking up towards the entrance hall. The further he got from the teacher the angrier he felt himself becoming. 

He longed for the street. Already the castle was confining and uncomfortable- he wanted to sleep on a rooftop again. In the streets of London, Harry Potter would have killed Snape for being such a prick to him in there.

_But then, _he thought, o_n the streets of London I wouldn't have met him._

He couldn't help thinking Snape quite lucky for that fact.

In his spare two hours he decided to investigate some more of the castle, and to his delight, he found the passage up to one of the battlements. It wasn't the tallest but it was quite large and comfortable enough. He had a cigarette before going back indoors.

Cutting into his lunch hour, McGonagall held him back after Transfiguration to have a go at him about his conduct in Potions.

He told her very simply that he'd done nothing wrong.

He knew she was about to discipline him somehow and he wasn't in the mood, so he looked down at his feet and hunched his shoulders.

"It's just," he'd said, "I'm not exactly used to having teachers, and people having control over my life. I'm sorry, I guess, but it'll take me some time to adapt to."

He'd walked out without a single point being deducted. Why he cared about that, he didn't know- he'd just wanted to escape some shitty little detention.

After lunch came Defence against the Dark Arts. This class disappointed him immensely- it was taught by a total fuckwit. After all he'd read he'd expected to enjoy this class most- Dark Magic as a whole was totally fascinating to him. As were those who practised it. But Professor Quirrel, with his ridiculous stutter and out of place turban, was a bloody idiot. Harry felt he could have corrected him on his lecture on four separate points.

One of his fellow Gryffindor Housemates asked Quirrel about his turban, and the man made up some bollocks story about a zombie. It was all Harry could do not to walk out. He simply sketched eighteen to-scale _Kata_ sword forms in a row across his work and didn't hand it in at the end.

There was something not quite right, Harry felt, about Professor Quirrel. He just – wasn't quite realistic. _Even though nothing about this entire place is realistic, _he thought dryly. But still- he couldn't put his finger on it, but it was as though he was just _too much_ of a boob, almost as though he was putting it on - exaggerating it slightly – but why would he do that? Wouldn't the man _want _the respect of the class? Harry couldn't figure it out. The only thing he could think of was that Quirrel really _didn't_ know a damn thing about his subject, so wanted to disguise this fact by making himself look like an insecure, stuttering fool. But _why _was the question.

Harry now sat on his bed in Gryffindor tower, practising basic charms into mid-air. He'd decided that even if he couldn't be the best at charms, he'd at least be on par with the rest of the class.

"_Wingardium Leviosa,_" he said to his neighbour's pillow. He stumbled over the words and scowled as nothing happened. _Fucking stupid sounding words._

He dropped his wand, deciding to try to focus his frustration to make something happen. He closed his eyes, let his irritation build into anger, slowly, like swimming deeper and deeper into the ocean, and then he outstretched his arms slowly and pictured the pillow in his mind's eye. Then he closed off all emotion before it overcame him.

Opening his real eyes he saw the pillow start to lift, twitching very slightly. It arose slowly, as though something at the same time was pushing it down again, and Harry fought to concentrate.

Then Dumbledore's face, with no warning or reason, popped into his head.

The pillow burst into flames.

"Oh – shit," Harry said, clearing his head of emotion as he doused the pillow and then attempted the charm of repairing it.

The repairing one actually worked, thank god, so he didn't have to hunt down spare linens for Ron's bed. He fixed everything and only a faint smell of singed cloth lingered. Harry put his wand back in his holster with a thought, tired and unhappy and beginning to feel the effects of not eating for a whole day.

Just as he was debating whether or not to conjure his own dinner right here in the room, just as he had been for years on the street, a black shape flew in the window.

"What the – _Mar_? Jesus, I thought you'd decided against it."

With everything happening he'd damn near forgotten about his pet raven… although it disappearing for two days had kind of rid him of any delusions about it being his pet.

The bird flew to his shoulder and perched upon it. Harry sighed and looked at it out of the corner of his eye.

"How are you, Mar?" Harry asked absently, obviously not expecting an answer from the bird.

Imagine his surprise when a croaky voice near his ear said, "Tired."

* * *

Dumbledore sat at his desk, fire smouldering in the corner, Fawkes slumbering in his perch, with a cup of hot tea untouched in front of him. He held a quill pen in his hand and looked at the sheet of paper in front of him. 

'Potter' was its title.

On it he'd compiled every little detail he knew about the boy, about where he'd been, Harry's psychology and about what his subject teachers had told Dumbledore about him.

It came to half a page.

_Minerva certainly thinks highly of him, _he thought as he read it through again. _And Severus is the opposite. But I could have prophesised that before he'd started his classes. Filius was disappointed with him but said he shows potential and thinks him, although not sociable, pleasant enough. Pomona sings his praises as though he were a member of her own house. Quirrel, in his usual way, barely even registered Harry was in his class._

He put the pen down and sat back, thinking to himself.

_He hasn't been seen with a trunk- he didn't have one on the train- but he must have some storage somewhere upon him. He has a very, very foul mouth, but considering he apparently grew up on his own in central London that is easily explained. What had he been introduced to of had inflicted upon him whilst growing up? If he was really on his own, he could have any number of bad habits. How did he survive? How did he get his school things and gear and wand unless… unless someone introduced him to it all? He must have had a guardian somewhere. A guardian that introduced him to Diagon Alley. He can't be as advanced in some of his classes as he is unless he had some sort of training._

_Which means he was using magic, _he suddenly realised.

Dumbledore absently scratched his temple, a place recently wounded by a gunshot graze after the Mundungus Fletcher muggle-mob fiasco. He was tired and confused. But he might have just found a way to track young Mr. Potter… and whoever he'd been with…

His note to Gringotts had already been ignored, but this was different. Ollivander and himself had been acquaintances for a long time.

He jotted out a note to Mr. Ollivander regarding Harry's wand- the man had the memory of an elephant- and asking for any details that may assist him in his investigation.

When he'd sent Fawkes in a flash of fire to Ollivander's, he sat back, sipping his tea finally, trying to think of what else to write on his sheet of paper about Harry Potter.

* * *

Harry sat dumbly for a moment, not sure he was in his right mind.

"Mar, did – did you just _talk_?"

There was silence for only a second before the same croaky voice answered, "Yes."

Harry closed his eyes, breathing deeply, trying to get his head around this.

"Right. So – so you're a magic, talking raven then, I suppose."

"Yes," it said again.

Harry laughed out loud and felt the bird jump and ruffle its feathers in surprise.

"I've never read about this," Harry said after a moment. "Are there a lot of you?"

"All ravens able. Few taught."

"Why didn't you talk to me before? You presumably were taught a while ago- I had no idea you could."

"Now you know," it said in its strange, rough-yet-high-pitched squawk. "Only just to you. Not near other."

"So only in private?" Harry asked, coming to grips with this very slowly.

"Yes in private," it said.

"So," Harry said, realising, "When Mike said you carried messages, he didn't mean in letters, did he."

"No," the raven said. Did Harry detect a hint of pride? "Every word spoken. Good memory."

"That's – that is…" Harry said, but struggled to think of any word for it but _fucking quality._

_I think there may be parts about the life of a wizard that I really enjoy,_ he thought.

"So," Harry said, revelling in this novelty, "are there many ravens around belonging to people who are like you?"

"All ravens able. Few taught," it said again. "Not often. I talk with birds."

"And translate?" Harry asked incredulously.

"I may try."

_Holy shit,_ he thought. He was envisioning some mass-expansive spy ring of birds around this castle when the door to the room opened.

"Hey, Harry- shit, what's that?" Seamus said.

Harry looked over- he'd had respect for Seamus in that he was one of the few people his age who could walk into a room and see him and not recoil, but simply greet him normally.

"This is Mar," Harry said, suddenly aware that his conversation with the bird would now be at an end in the presence of someone else. "My raven."

"Cool," Seamus said.

As Seamus went about his business, Harry watched him silently. That was the difference, he'd decided- Seamus said not a single word about ravens being against the school rules… he just said 'cool'. No questions, nothing.

"Cool indeed," Harry said to himself, standing up and turning to his bed.

After some investigation, he pulled out a few books, inspiration striking him to perform something- if he was able- that would be _really_ cool. He also decided that, spending his time at Hogwarts, he'd need a hell of a lot more cigarettes than just 200.

"Mar," he whispered to the bird on his shoulder, "Can you ask Mike to send me some fags please? Tell him I'll pay him back. Unless you're too tired- it's not urgent-"

But the bird was off his shoulder in a second and had gone out into the night. Harry looked after it, surprised but feeling very pleased.

"Harry," Seamus said before he went out. "You know, mate, you really should eat something. You not coming to meals is drawing attention, eh."

Harry nodded at him.

As he sat on his bed, hunger forgotten, he opened his first book- _Magic of the Mind_ by G.G. Kevins- to begin to plan his development.

* * *

Professor Dumbledore looked at the note from Mr. Ollivander, then at the note from the Ministry of Magic, with only one thought on his mind.

_This makes no sense._

According to the Underage Magic office, Goshawk told him there had been none at all recorded in London for years that had remained untracked or unaccounted for. According to Ollivander Harry had only received his first wand just over a week ago. _Alright, those concur, _Dumbledore thought. _So… how has he got advanced in magic?_

Looking at the charts he'd requested be sent to him a few days ago, he saw that there was more magic than usual around central London in the past four years, but not enough to cause an investigation or enquiry. _Even if there had been, they wouldn't have bothered, _Dumbledore thought sourly.

But his mind kept flicking back to that mage that had bested him and Snape using the element of surprise at Fletchers house. What he'd seen there made no sense. The Ministry was _supposed_ to have recorded every single magic user in England… they wouldn't let Dumbledore see those records, but still, he needed to know not only how Harry Potter had been practising spells (or how he'd become so talented _without_ practising spells) but _who that wizard had been._

Everything was confusion- nothing made any sense at all.

_Is there a rogue warlock on the loose in London?_ He thought, more than a bit scared. _Is it possible the same man took in Harry off the street and taught him everything? Why didn't I detect Harry lying to me, then?_

Albus worked late into the night, coming no closer to any answers but drawing a hundred more questions.

* * *

Harry had a plan.

It was only in his head for the moment- it wasn't the sort of thing one wrote down- but he could recall every single detail of it. It wasn't really too complex to remember- a few basic details and fine points needed work, but otherwise he was set.

He'd start in the break between his last lesson of the next day, which ended at 4, and the beginning of his first Astronomy practical lesson. That gave him 6 hours.

He played over the details in his head again before settling down to sleep.

It was at 6am that he awoke the next morning. He was in a rather good mood, conjuring himself some breakfast without thinking while he was still in bed and eating it as he changed.

Mar was back. Harry thanked him, taking the two cheap 20-deck packets hung with string from his beak, and went down to the entrance hall not long afterwards as the bird went out to hunt.

Walking down the stairs in his robes, he looked out of the front doors and saw a black shape moving in the distance, down the hill. It was moving sharply and precisely, very quickly and then eventually went out of sight.

Smiling to himself, Harry went outside into the morning, rolling his shoulders.

* * *

Author's Note:

_Thanks for reading. Just so you know, Ravens are the most intelligent of all birds and research is being conducted to comprehend exactly how intelligent they are. I've done my reading up lol ;) they are actually, seriously, more capable of human speech than parrots. So if this Raven is magical, I'm _**so**_ using my artistic license to make Mar talk. Sorry if you're averse to that. I promise it had something to do with the plot…_


	12. The Puzzle Piece

_Haven't excercised my action-writing in a long time, I hope it's readable. Thanks to all for the reviews._

_About finances... Who knows, maybe after some consideration he's decided he'd perhaps wait and see where this sueing idea the goblins seem so keen on will take him..._

_Tower of London Ravens... I considered that, funnily enough, but couldn't work it into the plot until much later so I'm not sure if I'll be able to. Thanks for the reminder _

_Mark - if you want less-super, less-abused, less-proficient and less-interesting Harry, you're welcome to go and read J.K. Rowling's series which happens to be titled the Harry Potter series. The seventh book is nearly out, look into it while the special offers are still on. For as long as Unforgiven remains my tribute-fiction story, it be exactly that. I apologised at the start for how fast paced it would be, I never normally write like this... it is a literary experiment. It is more an exploration of a style of writing but with my own creativity and artistic licence allowing the Harry Potter to be something I've never let him be before than anything else. If people enjoy it along the way, that is a definite plus. If they don't, I'd like to know why in a verifiable manner so it can help me improve my storytelling._

_A-Man; I've studied both and have my own opinions on them, which have been expressed. If you know of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, practitioners keep their opponents very close to the body so that such strikes as knees and elbows have very little effect. However, I believe strongly that it is **not **the martial art itself but the skill of the practitioner that wins a fight. Despite his experience, Harry is not all he thinks he is... Ali is extremely better-trained. I hope it's readable despite our differing opinions._

_If_ you _don't like it, please save me and anyone reading the reviews the boredom of hearing your opinion when it is lacking in any useful, integral or constructive points. Thank you._

_I hated writing this chapter. I hope it's more fun to read than it was to create._

* * *

"Good morning, Harry Potter." 

"How's it hanging, Ali."

The black boy, shirtless and glistening, smiled his feral smile at him.

"You ready?"

Harry frowned.

"I haven't warmed up. I just got here."

"That's not my fault."

Harry began to think that maybe this wasn't such a good idea. Then he remembered- he was Shujin. He'd been fighting to survive on the streets of London for four years. This kid looked, although strong, pampered and kempt.

"Right."

He took off his robes and school stuff, laying them in a pile, not really sure what to expect of Ali so keeping him in the corner of his eye. He undressed down to his trousers and took off his belt.

Beginning to stretch and work his muscles, he saw his opponent doing the same.

"Rules?" he asked Ali.

"Good question," the boy said, but didn't answer.

Harry sighed. If he wanted street rules, he'd get street rules. He left his wand holster on but took his wand out of it. He was better without that damned thing anyway.

"Magic or no?"

"Absolutely not."

"Alright, in which case," Harry said, rolling his neck and shoulders, "No low blows and no running."

"No low blows," the boy repeated, smiling at him, eyebrow raised.

"Let's at least pretend we're gentlemen."

"Fuck you," the boy said in a low voice.

Harry couldn't tell if this was tough-talk, going into a fight, or whether there was something more to it.

"Let's do this, then," Harry said.

Harry hung back, waiting with his fists up and on the balls of his feet, and so did Ali but with a different stance. Both were sizing the other up. They circled half-heartedly, Ali's smile disappeared and replaced by a look Harry knew- that of a trained fighter, retreating into himself, all concentration on the match to come.

Harry didn't watch his eyes directly; he watched the kid's naval, just under the neck. Ali was using the opposite method, staring straight into his eyes.

Together, mutually, they came together.

Harry went on the immediate defensive- Ali was striking every so often, moving swiftly and with acute accuracy, and Harry moved his body to deflect the kicks and blows, turning and writhing, looking for an opening.

Ali hooked him in the jaw then dived at Harry's legs- Harry raised a knee and moved back, bringing his elbow down on the flesh of the boy's back. Ali didn't make a sound, he kept moving like a dancing cobra, trying to get a hold on Harry and get around his back.

Harry began to lay into Ali with knees and elbows and the boy defended half-heartedly before, with the speed of a bullet, grabbing Harry's knee with his right hand and driving a hard right elbow into his stomach. Using his weight, Ali suddenly pushed Harry over backwards, landing on top of him.

Squeezing Harry to him with what was almost affection, Ali hooked his head in the crease of his elbow, bending Harry's head forwards and holding his arms back. Harry kneed him in the leg and tried to throw himself out or reverse the position, but Ali held firm.

Ali began to apply more pressure, landing the occasional punch on Harry's midsection, which the boy knew he'd end up feeling later. A rib might have cracked.

Harry suddenly, like a striking snake, pushed a sharp hand up into the flesh of Ali's neck, making the boy gag, and pushed his pressure point up until the boy let go. Harry dove left, under the weight of Ali, and drove his right elbow into the boy's side, pushing him over and landing on top of him.

Attempting to pin the boy, knowing that Ali's grasp would prevent him getting up, Harry drove an elbow into his collar then another into his temple, but it was as though he'd done nothing. Ali pulled Harry's head down again, the same move but in a different position, locking his neck and squeezing. Harry couldn't strike him.

Harry was beginning to regret saying 'no low blows'.

He drove a fist into the boy's diaphragm, which had some effect, and span himself around in the momentarily loosened grip so that he was facing up on top of the boy. The downside was that the soft flesh of the neck was now exposed and he felt himself choking, but he used his elbows to pummel the black boy's sides, then Ali then turned himself, so that Harry was suddenly on the floor next to him. He found his elbows couldn't reach the boy.

He kicked downwards with a leg, tensing his neck, kicking the boy's kneecap and getting a grunt of pained surprise from him. Harry pushed up on the gripping arm before Ali could reach his kidneys for a cheap shot, realising that was what he intended from behind him, and got the arm over his head and away from his neck. He rolled away, fighting for breath.

He got immediately to his feet, seeing that Ali was already on his own, and for a moment they stood there, both catching their breath.

He hoped Ali didn't hold it there- he had no intention of stopping. He got low, raised his fists, and waited.

Ali didn't stop- he attacked with renewed vigour, landing kicks and jabs on Harry when he wasn't quick enough to dodge or when he didn't recognise a feint. Harry realised how out-of-practise he was. But in return, Harry hit him consistently, and although he didn't strike – strike – kick – kick over and over again like his opponent, he hit out when he could, and all his punches and knees landed.

Eventually, Ali landed a kick to Harry's knee which nearly made him fall, but he used a page from the boy's own book before Ali himself could, and grabbed Ali around the back of the head. Ali foresaw it, and raised his arms below his chin to deflect a knee, so Harry used his head.

For a second they both saw stars as Harry's head butt landed on the flesh of the boy's nose, breaking it, but the next thing he knew Ali had somehow recovered and had launched himself on top of Harry.

Harry was then subjected to an arm bar and decided he didn't like it as he felt his wrist dislocate. He focused out the pain as Ali held on nonetheless- trying to pop his shoulder- knowing that he'd end up using his Art by mistake.

Harry grunted, grabbing Ali's foot, forcing it over his head and getting into a sitting position. He'd been planning an ankle-lock but knew he'd never hold it- he was a striker, not a grappler. From his vantage point he- instead of pulling his arm away- used it to launch himself over the body of his opponent and connect with a jab to the boy's neck.

Ali choked, but grabbed Harry's head and rolled over, once again getting into a vantage point.

Instead of gripping him in some complex hold again, Ali straddled him, pinning Harry's arms against his sides, and started landing strike after strike against Harry's face. He could see Ali's eyes, cold and detached, and decided he literally would not survive unless he did something about this situation.

He lifted his legs, harder than it sounds, up and gripped with his feet around Ali's neck, pushing upwards, but Ali bent forward out of his reach, arms around Harry's throat, cutting off his air.

_Shit, _Harry thought, struggling but not managing to do anything. _Fucker's gone and beaten me._

As he fought for breath he felt his vision begin to swim. He had no idea what to do- he wasn't about to sacrifice his honour and call upon his art… he'd have to wait until the grip relaxed… he felt himself gagging, choking, there was no air in his lungs and no oxygen reaching his brain…

Suddenly a voice cried, "_Impedimenta_!"

Harry recognised a slowing charm of such force that he and Ali were catapulted away from each other, both of them landing in the grass fifteen feet apart.

Harry realised he couldn't move.

"_What_," Professor McGonagall's voice shrieked, "In the name of _Merlin_ do you boys think you are doing!?"

The feeling of being trapped wore off, and Harry was on his feet, catching his breath, looking towards his head of house. She looked even more shocked when she saw who it was.

"Ali Sumesqi and Harry Potter! I'd never have – two of my top students! At the beginning of the year! What _on earth_ possessed you to – to exhibit such a violent display of muggle duelling? Never, in all my years-"

"Please, Professor," Ali's voice said sharply. "It wasn't what it looked like."

"What it looked like?" She shrieked at him. "How dare – what it _looked like_, Mr. Sumesqi, was you trying to strangle a first year to death!"

"Look at us, Professor," Harry said. His voice carried over the space now he'd got his breath back. "Look at how we are dressed and prepared. We weren't fighting."

"What do you call what I saw then, Potter?" She said loudly.

"Sparring. It was a practise session- for sport."

"Consensual," Ali added. "Harry has studied fighting arts and so have I… we were showing each other what we can do."

"_Be that as it may,_" the Professor said crisply, "Such displays are _not_ permitted! I've never seen such barbaric violence displayed by two young students. It frankly disgusts me!"

"Whether it disgusts you or not, Professor McGonagall," Harry said loudly, his blood high. "Ali and I are free to exercise together in the morning, are we not?"

"Exercise? Gods, _exercise,_ yes, not try to kill each other!"

"We were _not_ doing anything of the sort, Professor," Harry said bitingly. "We were exercising. That is what it was. If you knew anything at all about what you were criticising you would know that. As it stands, you _don't._ It has nothing at all to do with you what we decide to do in the mornings, and because it was consensual- as in _we both agreed and participated-_ practise sparring for sport purposes, we cannot be punished for it."

Professor McGonagall had suddenly gone from horrified and angry to terribly cold, in under a second. She looked at Harry with fire in her eyes.

"Punish you for _this,_ Mr. Potter, I may not be able to do. But punish you for your _disrespectful attitude _towards a teacher- and your own head of house no less!- I certainly can. How _dare you-"_

"No disrespect was intended," Ali said quietly. McGonagall ignored him, continuing her rant, so Harry repeated it louder.

"I wasn't disrespecting you, Professor. I think very highly of you in _your chosen field._ But the fact remains; you know little of what you saw. We're both very sorry that you saw it, and even more sorry that you chose, in your shock, to react the way you did, but that is not our fault."

"And _still_!" she shouted. "Still, you answer back. You will not learn, Potter, that in this institution you may _not_ talk to your superiors the way you are! You – you have an excellent attitude in class," she said, visibly trying to calm herself down, "and you are professional and mature, but you must learn that you _cannot_ talk to your Deputy Headmistress, or _any_ teacher, the way you do! Fifty points from Gryffindor and Ravenclaw! And a detention for you, Mr. Potter. And if I ever see either of you-"

"_Fine,_" Harry said loudly, absolutely furious. "If deducting points from your own house makes you feel better, do it, and I'll serve a detention without fuss. But I won't stand for you taking points from him- he's done nothing wrong at all."

"That is _not for you to decide!_"

"Deduct as many points as you like then! Fuck this, Professor, if you'll excuse my language, but who says that I will _willingly_ stay a student in an institution as _unjust_ as this is appearing to be!? The Honoured, reputable Headmaster trying to _drug me_, you deducting points here and everywhere for no reason, the Potions master being the victimising _arse _that he is- perhaps I should just go. Your perfect, beautiful little institution would clearly be better off without me."

Professor McGonagall was speechless. She was deathly pale and her mouth hung open as she stared at him. Harry was breathing heavier than he had been in the fight.

"Screw this. I'll pack and leave if you want. I -"

He'd been about to say _I get better treatment on the streets of London_, but he finally found some self control. He choked slightly. His head down, he gathered his clothing and strode past her straight up into the castle, cradling his wrist.

_I miss the sound of cars,_ Harry realised.

* * *

'Your detention will be served on Friday evening with the Headmaster' was all that the note said. It had appeared on his plate as he sat down for lunch. 

He sighed, wondering what the hell he was going to do with himself. He'd missed History of Magic, the first hour of that morning, getting himself fixed up. Ali had come in as he was getting healed by the Matron, and had winked at him but not said anything. Harry had no idea what the wink had meant. He'd left as soon as he'd been ok.

He went to Herbology, a theory lesson, in which he'd planned- in the peace and quiet of his own mind- the ritual he'd partake in that evening whilst absently and automatically taking notes on Sprout's lecture.

Potions had been before lunch and had been absolutely joyful- apparently, Snape had decided against growing up a bit in Harry's absence, and was his biting, arrogant, usual self. Harry decided he'd have to get used to the remarks, and fought not to answer back for the whole lesson, completing the potion perfectly whilst further planning that evening in his head. Snape had been speechless by the end.

Harry hadn't looked at or spoken to anyone in either class, enjoying his own privacy, and had taken no notice of what they were doing and saying.

Now was lunch. He wasn't hungry but had decided to put in an appearance.

Putting some food on his plate he started to chew absent-mindedly, bored of eating already, mindful of the whispers directed his way. He heard the word 'fighting' from his own table, and grimaced, wondering how news had travelled so fast. Eventually he found out how.

Seamus and Dean, the two boys in his dormitory, sat down opposite him and immediately started talking.

"Jees, Harry!" Dean said.

Seamus agreed with, "Spill."

Harry looked at them, face blank, before enquiring, "What?"

"Well," Dean said grandly, "you waltz into lessons an hour late, you're covered in bruises and your eyebrow is cut, and the whole school is talking about _Harry Potter_ getting into a scrap with a third year!"

"What the hell happened, Harry?" Seamus asked, quieter.

"It was hardly a scrap," Harry mumbled. The two boys laughed.

"Who was it?" Seamus asked.

"They're saying it was that Ravenclaw Matthews-"

"Stop it. Both of you," Harry said sharply. "I'm not just a fucking gossip mill."

Both were silent for a second.

"Sorry mate," Seamus said eventually.

"Yeah," Dean said, but ruined it with, "Did you win?"

Harry stood and walked away from them, ignoring the whispers from around him. Before he reached the door, a bushy head bounded towards him from the Entrance Hall.

"Harry!" Hermione said, hands over her mouth. "Are you ok? I saw what happened!"

He was going to ignore her, then something came very subtley into place in his head.

"What?" Harry asked her in a low voice.

"I saw that boy on top of you- I was in the library, near the window. I was so scared, he had-"

"Hermione," Harry said, suddenly realising something. "Shut up for a second. Are you telling me that _you_ were the one who told McGonagall?"

"I – I – well, _yes_, Harry! Of course I did, you were being attacked by an older student!"

Harry closed his eyes, reigning in his emotions, not trusting himself to do or even say anything.

He tried to walk past her but she said after him, "Harry? Harry – are you ok? Do you need to see the Nurse?"

Harry turned and gave her a look that made her actually shrink backwards in fear.

"In future," he said icily. "Keep your _fucking_ nose out of other people's business. _You_ lost Gryffindor 50 points today. _You _got me a detention. Face it, damn you- you _do not_ know everything. I wasn't getting beaten up – I - I… oh, _fuck it_. Just leave me the fuck alone."

He couldn't be bothered with her stupid, innocent, hurt little face anymore. He turned his back on her and walked into the entrance hall.

Praying the drama was over for the day, just wanting to get double charms out of the way so he could do his ritual, he walked towards the stairs… but it was not to be.

Suddenly his legs locked together without warning. He gave a half-cry of shock and tumbled onto his face, confused and now _very_ pissed off.

"Ahaha!" a voice jeered from the other side of the hall. "Look at him- Potter just _can't help_ getting his arse kicked all the way to-"

"Shut it, Malfoy," Ron's voice suddenly said from the top of the stairs.

"Oh, Merlin, look- it's a _weasel_."

"You shouldn't attack him," Ron said warningly. "He could kick the piss out of you."

Malfoy laughed his whiny little laugh and drawled, "You think I'm scared of him? A half-blood street-rat? Or perhaps of you, Weasley? A ginger blood-traitor."

Harry hadn't said anything- he was undoing the curse wrapping his legs together strand by magical strand, floating in a state of calm as he worked, sitting on the bottom step of the main staircase.

"Malfoy, you wimp! Say that to him or me without your idiot friends on either shoulder, you wuss! Harry beat up a third year, and after what happened on the train, you should know not to piss him off."

_Nearly done…_

"Sod you, you stupid little Weasley queer. I could duel you two on my own, any time. You don't know what you're getting yourself into, blood-traitor. You may as well have been born a mudblood."

_There._

Harry stood silently, watching Ron and Malfoy square up against each other in the middle of the hall, a small crowd of spectators growing. With a thought, Harry's wand was in his hand. He raised it.

"_Enough!_" A voice screamed from the Main Hall doorway. Harry looked over, wand still on Malfoy's group, and saw Professor Sprout standing there, hands in the air, looking almost comical in her indignant horror.

She was looking at Malfoy and Ron… Harry wisely lowered his wand, putting it away with a flick and leaning on the banister.

"Mr. Malfoy! How _dare_ you use such language within the walls of this school! Who by the Earth do you think you are? And Mr. Weasley- letting yourself get riled up! Two such incidents in a single day- _honestly_!"

"Professor," Malfoy quickly said, "Weasley was-"

"Defending his friend," Sprout said coldly.

Ron gave a glance to Harry that suggested he wasn't entirely sure he was a friend of Harry's, but said nothing. Harry became angrier.

"You two," Sprout continued. "My office, _now._"

Harry wasn't sure how friendly Ron would be to him now he was going to be punished on his behalf, but he didn't care about that. He didn't care about his crowd of spectators or about lessons or reputation or about anything at all.

The only thing he cared about was that he was going to kill Draco Malfoy.

* * *

With Harry's mind made up, it was a simple matter of waiting for the opportune moment. He had other things to achieve before he did it- he would see to his own business before following up on his latest self-promise. 

But, he knew, Draco Malfoy would find himself face-down in the Hogwarts lake by the time he was done with him.

Flitwick, throughout charms, seemed colder to Harry than usual. Harry remembered eventually that he was the head of Ravenclaw, the house that had- along with his own- lost 50 points that morning. Harry didn't care hugely, but when he couldn't manage the _incendio_ charm, he was one of the few who got a mountain of extra homework.

Hermione was cold, silent and clearly upset for the entire lesson. Harry hardly noticed.

The lesson passed quickly and Harry went straight back up to his dormitory, readying himself and then when he reached it, preparing his things for what he'd need to do. He got his cauldron, ingredients, a feather from Mar, some of the runic rocks he'd got from Diagon Alley, and his dagger, all from his trunk.

Then he opened the trunk with the combination 4 – 3 – 2 – 1.

He climbed into the largest compartment, lighting it with a wave of his hand and closing the lid on top of him. He descended the silk ladder into the room, feeling the grey silk all around him and smelling the fresh, leathery smell.

He undressed, readied everything, sat crossed-legged and ran through it in his head, the books open in front of him anyway. It wasn't dissimilar to planning a sequence of _katas_, as his Sensei had often made him do. This was just… more dangerous.

With a deep breath he got to work.

* * *

"Merlin," Dumbledore breathed. 

He dropped the letter on his desk after reading it again. He put his head back on the chair and removed his glasses- he didn't have company so instead of cleaning them he simply put them on top of the letter. His glasses never really needed cleaning, with all of the enchantments on them. But he wasn't thinking about his glasses at that moment.

Albus Dumbledore had lived through _better _school weeks than this.

He replaced his glasses, consciously battling a headache, and picked up the letter once more.

_Albus Dumbledore,_ it read simply.

_This is your official notification of the beginning one year period you have in which to transfer the ownership, entire funds and Key of vault 687 to Mr. Harry Potter. The vault is, according to our records, a quantity left to Mr. H. Potter by Lily and James Potter in 1980 and Harry is the sole surviving heir. Should you wish to appeal to the bank and court that the money is indeed yours you must do so through the bank by March 1__st__ next year. This missive is also to inform you that, in place of the rightful funds that should have gone to Mr. Harry Potter on his reintroduction to the magical world, Ten Thousand Wizarding Galleons have been withdrawn from the Hogwarts School official account, vaults 59, 300 and 301 respectively, and deposited in a private and freely accessible account belonging to Master Potter. No matter what the outcome, this compensation will not be refunded. Failure to comply and either appeal or officially refund(with witnesses) Mr. Harry Potter by September 1__st__ one year from now will result in a lawsuit being brought against you for unjustifiably withholding funds that are not rightfully yours under the Goblin-Human Finances decree of 1562. Consider this your notice. Please do not reply to this letter. Regards- Marlik Ko, Deputy Chairman, Human Relations office, Gringotts._

Dumbledore was tempted to put the letter in the fire but decided against it- he'd need it in the future no doubt. He left it in a drawer of his desk with other Gringotts things, shaking his head, unhappy.

Grabbing a small silk sack of Floo powder he knelt in front of his fire. Taking some in his hand, he paused, debating with himself over what should be done.

_There's no question of not returning it,_ he thought. _Of course I will. I should have already- I merely forgot in the wake of everything else happening. Harry… probably won't understand, but I'll explain it nonetheless. Hagrid will still have the key-_

He was struck by sudden inspiration that stayed his hand.

_Perhaps it would be politic to let Hagrid give him the key..? He is, after all, the Keeper of the Keys,_ he smiled slightly. _It might be an olive branch from me, but in the long term, having Hagrid befriend Harry could become hugely advantageous._

He smiled to himself properly, satisfied, and threw some floo into the fire, making the flames burn bright green and billow up around him as he submerged his head into them.

"Hagrid's Hut!" he shouted.

The world of green dissolved around him, his head swaying slightly as the magic made it feel as though it were moving, and before he knew it he was peering from floor-leve1 into Hagrid's hut.

The huge man was in, fortunately, but his back was turned as he fussed with something on his kitchen table.

Dumbledore, smiling, coughed very slightly but the giant didn't notice.

"Hagrid," he ventured quietly.

Still the man bustled around. _Perhaps he's acquired a delightfully deadly new pet,_ Dumbledore thought, trying to maintain his good humour and get a little of the old twinkle back in his eye.

"Hagrid?" he said, louder.

Oblivious, Hagrid still moved whatever it was around on the table, sitting with his back turned. Dumbledore frowned.

"Good evening, my boy," he said at last, very loud.

Hagrid jumped at the voice, spinning around at a speed that would have made any normal chair collapse under his size, and he cried, "Professor Dumbledore, sir!"

"Yes, Rubeus, I apologise for my intrusion but – Hagrid? Hagrid – are you alright?"

The man was crying slightly, furiously pawing away tears off his red face.

"Ah – ah, yes, I'm just – yer know, when you think abou' things sometimes… I'm fine now. Just – just caugh' up wi' me."

He gave a monstrous sniff, then pulled out a handkerchief and blew his nose. Dumbledore winced.

"Hagrid, I'm terribly sorry. If this is a bad time I shall return with some more courteous warning-"

"No – no, Headmaster sir, I'm fine. Please, what do yer need? Is it abou' Halloween?"

Dumbledore watched him, a kindly smile on, and said, "Actually, Hagrid, it's about young Master Potter."

To his surprise Hagrid began crying again- pathetic, huge, floor-shaking groans and tears the size of a baby's fist.

Dumbledore frowned.

"Aw – that's – that's what aye was cryin' abou', sir – oh, give me a – give me a second, sir," he wailed.

When Hagrid had got himself together and Dumbledore's knees were really beginning to hurt, despite the soft carpet of his office, Dumbledore waited for him to speak.

"Aye, when I got back from – from the Dursley house… and I failed yer, Professor Dumbledore. I failed yer- I couldn't find him. He – he…"

"Is an elusive young man," Dumbledore said sternly. "Nonsense to that, Hagrid- you failed nobody."

"I failed _him_!"

Dumbledore opened his mouth, closed it again, thinking, changed his expression then opened it once more.

"Nobody expected Harry to be alive, Hagrid, yet I seem to remember you being one of the few who truly believed he'd survived and that he'd make it to Hogwarts. You were right- _I_ didn't even think he would. You had faith in him, you believed in him, and it paid off. So you absolutely did not, at all, fail him. I have failed Harry in ways you couldn't imagine. Belief is just one of the latest things- what he needs, more than anything, is people believing in him."

He'd chosen his words carefully but couldn't help feeling he'd said something wrong.

Hagrid said nothing, just sniffled, but apparently he didn't think something was said wrong- he looked a little better.

_Thank Merlin for simplicity, _Dumbledore thought mildly. _Simple problem, simple people, simple solution._

"That," he said, "and also the key to his vault."

Hagrid looked up.

"Oh – oh, righ', o' course Professor sir, I forgot – 'e never did get it, eh."

"He didn't. I was thinking it might be a good idea for you to invite Harry- if it's alright with you, of course- to your house for tea or something at the end of the week, after he's had a bit of time to settle in."

Hagrid brightened up considerably.

"Oh, absolutely, Professor Dumbledore sir. I'll gladly – well, I'll send 'im an owl in the morning. I still need to properly meet 'im!"

"I'm sure you'll get along swimmingly," Dumbledore said with a smile. Now his back was beginning to hurt too.

"Ah, yes – tell you wha', I'll bake some cakes too. Loads of 'em. And 'e can bring a friend."

"Wonderful. Now, I apologise again for interrupting you Hagrid, but I should go. I am in the middle of a pile of official looking letters just _trying_ to finish deciding which socks to wear tomorrow."

Hagrid chuckled with him. They bade each other goodnight and Dumbledore pulled his head back into his office.

He sighed, trying to think about something else.

* * *

"Absolute – total – fucking – _travesty_." 

Harry rarely got himself into a situation in which he had no idea what to do and he was beginning to regret rushing into this dangerous and ridiculous ritual.

"So what the hell do I do now?" he asked himself out loud.

The issues he'd run into were as numerous as the droplets of blood now covering the grey silk walls of this compartment. Such mundane things as having _forgotten_ to bring a mirror so he could see what he was doing, things he should have been able to control and should have thought of before such as his magic accidentally healing him every time he made a cut, all up to ridiculously complex things such as his enchanted tattoo of a dragon physically prohibiting him from bringing a blade anywhere near his body.

He'd conquered most. The Red Dragon lay dormant for the moment on his right shoulder, which had taken gallons of Harry's willpower, and he'd fetched a mirror from another compartment. He'd overcome his Art by making himself go in the strange, subconscious non-feeling state he'd gotten very good at.

When it actually came to it, and everything else was out of the way, Harry realised firsthand that it is actually _exceptionally_ difficult to cut an exact and precise rune onto one's skin. Especially with a dagger that could, with a single flick, take his arm off.

_At least I know why not many people do this now,_ Harry thought, looking at the tattered remains of his arm.

Somewhere in there, within the complex incisions that crisscrossed over his bicep, under all of the blood covering his entire upper-half and soaking his underwear and the walls, there was an actual _correct_ rune. Harry prayed that everything else around it- the dozen failed attempts- wouldn't make a difference.

He wiped some blood away vainly with his right hand, checking his arm in the mirror. He then grabbed the feather he'd got from Mar.

He'd felt light-headed when he began, despite having seen his own blood dozens of times before, but as he went on in his emotionless state it was as though he was cutting onto paper or card- he didn't feel a thing, he was just trying to get it right.

_Let's just finish this fucking thing,_ he thought, tired and unhappy.

With a disposable lighter he set the feather alight. It immediately began to rise, as the book said it would, but he held on with his pale, bloody left hand and with his right he held his hand up to the trickle of smoke, whispering.

This was supposed to be done with a wand, but Harry wasn't comfortable enough with his yet to trust it, so he was using wandless magic- his Art- to complete this utter mess of a ritual, praying all the while.

He'd captured a fair-sized globe of smoke, floating with the confines of his fingers and palm, making it look as though he held a storm cloud in his very hand.

"Thank god," he said quietly. He'd done it right.

A few trickles escaped from it, tendrils of silver spiralling up into the air, but Harry got his concentration back and, before anything else could go wrong, he pressed his hand and the ball of smoke into the new cut rune.

He knew that if he could feel pain, he'd be screaming right now.

He mentally held back both his natural magic, desperate to heal him, and the dragon tattoo that crowned his shoulder that felt like it could and would leap right off his arm to tackle anything threatening him.

He forced, using his Art, every tendril of smoke to conform to the runic shape before it entered his blood- he was tired and had lost a lot of it, so this took a lot of concentration, but using his fingers to direct it he managed it.

_Shit I need a drink,_ he thought as he siphoned the last of it in.

He sat there for a minute, trying to get his breath back, before he stood up very slowly and allowed his magic to heal him.

Despite standing slowly he still got a head rush. Now, with the ritual completed and about an hour before astronomy, all he could think about was one thing at a time, and as much as his body clamoured for sleep he knew blood was more important.

He got to the top of the filthy silk rope ladder, flung open the lid and, without a single thought for whoever might be in the room with him, climbed out of his trunk onto his bed.

Fortunately, even though Neville was in the room, Harry had been sensible enough to close the hangings on his bed before going in. At present he couldn't care less, and ignored Neville's question as to whether he was ok.

He fumbled with the locks before realising he'd left his wand in the grey silk compartment.

"Shit," he said quietly, and with bloody hands he slapped at the locks in the order 1 – 3 – 4 – 2, channelling his painful arm and Art into doing it right, and he praised all saints and martyrs as the lid popped open.

He was beginning to black out. The lack of food hadn't helped.

Thinking that as he fumbled through his apothecary compartment, reading vial labels as quickly as he could pick them up, he accidentally conjured a baked potato complete with butter and cheese right in his hands.

If he'd had the energy he'd have laughed, but at that point he was closer to throwing up.

He finally found the liquid- dark blue and opaque, bubbled slightly at being shaken around- and grabbed at the wax and cork stopper. When he got it off, he downed half of the bottle.

The taste alone nearly made him gag but he held it down.

Then he passed out.

* * *

It was about 3 a.m. He'd obviously missed astronomy. 

He didn't care.

His hangings were still shut so he reached over and opened them, then in the moonlight saw that he was now clean and healed, except for a small, complex grey scar on his left bicep.

He saw movement further down his double bed and his eyes widened, although he was in no way capable of defending himself now, but he realised it was only Mar, feasting on his baked potato near his feet.

Harry summoned all his mental energy, and projected, '_Can you hear me Mar?'_ without speaking, his eyes closed.

After a pause a strange, eerie, genderless voice echoed in his head, '_This is strange.'_

'_No',_ Harry said to his raven through their new link, his head falling back with a delirious smile on his face. '_This is a fucking miracle._'


	13. The Broken Window

_My endless, profusive thanks to all who have reviewed thus-far... comments are very welcome. Without feedback I have no idea if I'm doing ok or not. The style, plot, length and pace of this story are all completely different to what I usually write. Normally it's longer, more epic, long-winded and about 40 pages per chapter (this is 15)._

_Anyway... Welcome back, thanks for sticking with it to the end of book one! The next chapter will still be posted as 14, as usual, in a weeks time but you'll notice a difference in the story pace... and a teeny tiny difference in the actual plot... but I won't spoil it for you._

_I'm really looking forward to the response I get from this chapter._

_This is one of the few I've actually been ridiculously excited to post. Considering how agonising the chapter afterwards was to write I'll savour it_

_With regards to this becoming more of a mystery than a drama... you have no idea just how strange this story will become... never fear, though, it'll make sense in the end :)_

_Hooray for plot twists nobody sees coming!! Lol, please enjoy guys. Peace - GL._

* * *

He was deciphering scrawl. 

_Hello Harry! I thought maybe you might pay me a visit in my hut on Friday when you've got no lessons, I know you have the afternoon off. If you're busy that's ok, but you're invited, see. I'd do tea and things- I reckon me and you could be friends, or at least swap stories. You're not scared of dogs are you? Bring anyone you like._

It was signed by 'Hagrid'.

Harry sighed. He ate some more egg- his biggest breakfast yet, he'd noted, consisting of a half-plate of egg and toast- and rose from his seat. He took a swig of his water (poured from the tap upstairs and brought with him in a hip flask) and walked towards the head table.

He ignored the whispers.

"Harry," Professor Dumbledore greeted him with feigned cheerfulness. "You really ought not to wear that earring during school- Professor McGonagall would have an apoplexy."

"Is this my punishment? My detention?" Harry asked, holding up the note.

Dumbledore read it, handed it back to Harry and said, "Whatever do you mean?"

"Tea with the gamekeeper. Is that my detention?"

"I'd hardly call it a punishment…"

Harry stared at him.

"This is about as subtle a pump for information could get- if you're not trying to drug me, you're trying to get other staff to butter me up and spill my guts."

"Harry-"

"Is Hagrid aware you're manipulating him?" Harry asked with his voice low. "I don't think for a second he could have come up with this on his own."

Dumbledore looked shocked at the veiled insult.

"Harry- I assure you, this – I had no hand in this at-"

"You're hand _is_ all over it. You may as well have written the note."

"Harry," Dumbledore entreated, his hands held up. "Hagrid is a good, innocent man- this isn't some indiscrete ploy for your secrets! Hagrid knew your parents."

"So?" Harry said bitingly. "_I_ _didn't_. I can't think what the hell we'd talk about."

He stepped backwards, breaking eye contact and walking out of the hall. The few people up this early were watching him go- one was Ali, whose eyes were veiled as usual.

He felt someone coming up behind him and turned in the entrance hall- to his surprise it was Dumbledore himself.

"Harry," he said awkwardly. "Listen."

"Shoot," Harry said without a shred of treacherous emotion.

"Your bank account-"

Harry started to walk away again, going for the stairs, but he was stopped by the Headmaster's call- he didn't sound angry, just weary.

"_Harry_," Dumbledore said again when they were facing each other. "Hagrid is the keeper of the keys at Hogwarts. He has your Vault key. I promise you, that was the only reason I suggested to him to meet you on Friday. That's it. All I did was _suggest_ it- I got the letter of notice from Gringotts, and it reminded me, so I reminded him."

"Right," Harry said. _Aha, you stupid old bastard, you just handed me a key worth more than any vault._

"That's all."

Harry bit down a line about how they wouldn't trust their School vault keys in Hagrid's hands so why _his_, instead saying, "I'll meet him on Friday then. I'm sure he'll be delightfully clueless. If he hasn't managed to lose my key, I'll retrieve it from him and call off the bank… but I'm bringing my own tea."

As he walked up the stairs he bit his tongue. He wished he hadn't said if Hagrid hadn't _lost_ the key… he'd had to cover up. Fortunately, Dumbledore had absolutely no idea Harry had just given away a part of his plan.

* * *

His Thursday was Charms, Defence, Transfiguration and Herbology. The latter three he was fine at- although McGonagall really did have a go at him for having his earring in- but Charms was still a mission. He got theory homework back and marked for all of them though, and he could tell he'd impressed them. 

He was heading from the greenhouses back towards the front doors, behind everyone else, when he saw Malfoy. The blonde boy was walking slightly apart from the others in the entrance hall doors' arch, being his obnoxious self but obviously with something on his mind.

Harry waited until the crowds had gone in, keeping his head down, waiting outside until Malfoy's little therapeutic teasing was out of his system and the blonde walked away with his cronies towards the dungeons.

Harry followed, deathly silent, all the way to what must be their common room.

With a half-hearted check around them Malfoy said 'linguam serpens' under his breath and Harry rolled his eyes as the door to the common room opened. _Serpent's Tongue,_ he thought. _And I don't even know Latin._

He sank back into the shadows.

He hadn't forgotten his pledge to kill Draco Malfoy- for someone such as him, patience was the most opportune option. The time would come when it would be Malfoy and him, and just as though they were on the streets of Central London, Malfoy wouldn't walk away.

He regarded the door to the common room for Slytherin with not a flicker of emotion.

_I'll get him eventually- I'd love to make it look like someone else though. I wonder if I could create a murder-suicide with one of his thick-as-shit friends,,?_

He was absorbed in his own thoughts too much to notice the ghost until it was nearly upon him.

"_You_," said the Bloody Baron. "You need to be careful around here, little boy. Someone such as you could get hurt…"

"Because I'm under _so much_ threat from a ghost and a house full of save-our-skin pussies; good one," Harry said scathingly.

The Baron looked furious. It said, "Don't let me catch you near here again, foolish child."

"Right- _or_ you could fuck off. Try that out."

Harry walked on past the ghost, shaking his head, not bothering to look and check behind him.

* * *

His punishment for missing the first astronomy lesson was simply to copy down a nebula from the night sky that evening. He wasn't alone; two Slytherins, a Hufflepuff and one other Gryffindor were with him in the astronomy tower. He hadn't found it too hard to find but they evidently had, and he'd not told Sinistra that. 

He finished his first. It was acceptable, not brilliant- so he wouldn't be an astronomer, big deal. He had other things on his mind.

He walked silently to the other, more secluded corner of the astronomy tower with its open roof.

'_Mar',_ he called with his mind, knowing his raven would hear him and feeling ridiculously proud of himself.

'_Yes?'_

'_Can you do me a favour?'_

'_A message?'_

'_No… something requiring a bit more cunning.'_

The raven's bodiless, unearthly voice seemed to hum. Harry was still growing used to it.

'_Yes I can,'_ it said. '_Any cursed bird can carry a message. Occasionally I would like to do more demanding tasks…. If you will do things in return.'_

Harry smirked slightly, but sent, '_Of course.'_

'_Then what shall I do?'_

'_Would you be able to steal a particular key from the giant in the hut?'_

The bird considered.

'_Easy. Now?'_

'_When he's asleep.'_

'_He's asleep now'_

Harry peered out into the dark- the lights were off in the hut.

'_Where are you?' _Harry sent.

'_Near. Shall I do it now?'_

'_Go for it.'_

Harry thought he saw a black shape swoop from the trees towards the hut, but wasn't sure.

"Potter?" a voice said behind him.

He turned.

"Yes, Professor?"

Sinistra looked at him blandly.

"You've finished," she said. "You may go back inside."

"Just enjoying the night air."

"Curfew is gone by an hour."

"I won't be long."

She frowned slightly, but left him to it. Harry sighed- he'd have to go inside.

'_You'll have to be my eyes, Mar.'_

The bird sent, _'Alright. How many keys does this accursed man have?'_

Harry frowned, walking down the tower stairs.

'_You're already at his keys?'_

'_I'd be back with you now if he only kept one, but he has hundreds. Do you want them all?'_

'_No. It's – it isn't much help I know, but it's thick and probably brass or some magical alloy. Plain, simple key, quite small.'_

'_There are – four.'_

'_Describe them.'_

'_How does one describe a key?'_

Harry snorted. It was strange talking a language other than English and just inherently knowing how. The sent thoughts weren't really pictures, they were more – expressions. Like when a person speaking gesticulates with their hands- it's as though you were getting an entire conversation from watching their actions as they talk about something.

'_We need to practise this more- the book said at times, with training, we'll be able to see through each other's eyes.'_

'_Ok. But which key?'_

'_Shit. Uh… do they have any engravings on them?'_

'_They all do.'_

'_What do they say?'_

'_I have no idea. I can't read.'_

Harry laughed in frustration. Then he realised he must look like a crazy person to anyone not privy to his mind.

'_Can you describe the markings?'_

There was silence for a while. Harry tried not to panic- _why isn't he saying anything?_

Eventually he was back in Gryffindor Tower, getting there far quicker than he'd thought he would. Then Mar spoke up again.

'_I just nearly got eaten.'_

Harry stopped in the middle of the common room.

'_What?'_

'_You did not say he had a dog. A very big dog.'_

'_Shit- are you ok?'_

There was no reply.

Harry walked straight up to his dormitory- Seamus was in there, he paid him no attention. Harry walked to the window and opened it, saying, _'Come to the Tower window. Can you get out?'_

'_I'm on my way.'_

"You ok Harry?"

"Great. Catching some air."

"No worries," the boy said, fiddling with his trunk.

Harry's eyes stayed fixed outside. Eventually he caught sight of Mar. He groaned.

"Seamus, could I have a minute in here?"

Harry got a look from the boy, but Seamus said over his shoulder as he went out, "I'm brushing my teeth mate. About three minutes."

"Right," Harry said absently.

Then Mar flew in.

He had in his beak the key to vault 687 at Gringotts bank.

"I don't believe it," Harry said out loud, eyes wide. "Bollocks - shit- you actually did it. _How_ did you know which one?"

'_I didn't. I dropped the three others on my way back up.'_

Harry laughed loudly.

'_I hope they don't fucking find them. Damn- well done, Mar. That was ridiculously lucky.'_

'_Not for the dog.'_

'_What do you mean?'_

The bird looked at him.

'_I only got one eye out, but he will not attack me again.'_

'_You ate Hagrid's dog's eye?'_

'_Yes.'_

'_I suppose he'd have eaten you if you didn't,'_ Harry thought awkwardly. He had nothing against animals- just humans. He'd preferred the four-legged furry companions in London to the two-legged furry companions.

'_May I continue to hunt now?'_

'_Yeah of course- go. Thank you again.'_

The bird flew out. Harry sat down on his bed, holding his key, debating over what exactly he should do… or _not_ do… with it.

* * *

"Another cake, Harry?" 

He looked at the oversized gamekeeper. Kind smile, big heart- nauseously well-meaning.

"No I'm fine, thanks."

"Alrigh', not ta worry. So… how'd you enjoy yer first week?"

"Riveting."

Hagrid, not to be deterred, sat down opposite him again. He'd already asked Harry about friends, where he'd been, his earring and hair, how he knew he'd be a Gryffindor and asked where he'd been again. Harry, to his credit, was actually making an effort.

_It might be useful,_ he'd decided, _to have someone who knows as much about this place as Hagrid does to be on your side, even if he is Dumbledore's puppet._

"Got a favourite lesson or teacher?"

"Uh – not really. I like Sprout, though she's a bit daft. McGonagall's good in her way. Quirrel is an idiot," he said, and Hagrid spluttered on his tea. "It's true. It's like Snape- when he actually teaches me something I'll let you know how he got on... Although Snape seems to know a _bit_ about potions. They don't get along do they?"

"Professors Snape an' Quirrel? Oh, I don' know. Snape doesn' like a lot of people. It's just his way…"

"Yes, Hagrid, I know that first hand."

"What do ya mean?"

Harry shook his head, sipping his tea. He'd checked it as soon as he had a cup full, sniffing it suspiciously and testing for numbness on his lips. He was wearing his amulet and his tattoo was active and neither of them had even twitched, so he'd ended up drinking it- black, one sugar.

"Well," Hagrid said. "I suppose there's somethin' funny between them, but its professional competition… Snape wants the Dark Arts post, see."

"That's fascinating. Of all the people," Harry said sarcastically. Hagrid laughed.

Harry knew he shouldn't warm to a man like this but at this point he was past caring. He stroked the dog, Fang, absently, uncomfortably aware of his wounded eye-socket.

"What's wrong with his eye?" Harry asked, sounding concerned.

"Eh? Oh - Fang ran into a bit of trouble las' nigh'. I think 'e wen' for a school owl. He 'ardly ever does tha', an' I don' think 'e will anymore, hmm? Tricky little blighters. I'll have 'im fixed up in a few weeks, though, not to worry- e's suffered worse than that, in 'is day, Fang 'as. You got an owl, Harry?"

"No, I hate owls."

"Oh really? Ah, tha's a shame."

A few minutes passed in silence, Harry positioning thoughts in his head, meditating behind his trained expression, then Hagrid spoke again.

"Now, Harry, I'm not sure if Professor Dumbledore told you, but the real reason I called you dow' here was to give yer somethin' that should 'ave been given to yer a while ago."

Harry schooled his face.

"My bank stuff?"

"Tha's right."

Hagrid lifted from under his coat the largest ring of keys Harry had ever seen. It was almost comical- like nearly everything else here. There were keys of every single shape and size on every inch of it.

Hagrid began to fuss over the key ring. Then the fussing became fumbling. Then he began to fret horribly- his eyes wide and his fingers clumsy.

"What's the matter?" Harry asked carefully.

"I – I – the key… they key should be on this 'ere key ring. I don' – I don' understand."

"You lost my key," Harry stated flatly, not feeling anything.

"No – you don' understand – all of em. All my Gringotts keys… oh, Merlin, I don' – I can' – how've I done this?"

Hagrid was now in tears. He really was distressed. Harry felt an unfamiliar tug behind his sternum.

"For the school's upkeep vault, for your vault, for my vault and Professor Dumbledore's special one! Oh – Merlin, I can' believe this 'as happened…."

He seemed to have forgotten Harry was there. He chose that moment to make his exit.

"Tell Dumbledore," he said as he stood. "That he'll need to do better than that. He has until the beginning of summer before I prosecute. Sorry Hagrid, but this is way too convenient."

He swept out, cloak billowing in a satisfying way.

* * *

'_Mar'_ he sent out. 

After a few moments the reply came, _'Yes, Harry?'_

'_Are you busy?'_

'_What do you need?'_

'_I wondered if you could find those keys you dropped last night, I have an idea.'_

'_This evening I will be able to.'_

'_Thank you.'_

_Thank god for that,_ Harry thought, walking up the hill. _This is the ideal way to set someone up… but who?_

Suddenly, something was wrong.

After a moment, Harry realised he was on his back. His vision swam. He'd been punched, though he had no idea how.

He was up faster than lightning striking, dagger and wand both out, and in front of him wearing a self-satisfied smile was Ali.

Harry breathed hard. He hadn't seen him coming at all.

"Hello, Harry Potter," the boy said, smiling.

"You realise if you weren't someone I was acquainted with your innards would be decorating the lawn right now?"

"I know that better than most. That's how you _solve_ your problems, right?"

Ali laughed at him. It was a cold and unpleasant laugh.

"Put the knife away Potter, I've had my fun."

"I beg your fucking pardon?"

"I said, I've had my fun. You're no longer in danger. In fact, you're safer than you were before. I came to tell you-"

"You shut up right now mate or you're fucking dead."

Ali paused, smiling.

"As I was saying," he said clearly. "I came to tell you to come outside and exercise with me tomorrow morning. It's a Saturday- I like Saturdays. We don't have to fight-"

"Fucking stop me."

"Harry, honestly, calm down. It's good training for your reflexes."

"I am considering murdering you at present, Ali, my jaw stings and I'm about to blow. Don't fucking bait me."

Ali nodded. "Understood," he said. "I'll see you tomorrow morning, Harry Potter."

With that, he walked up to the castle.

Harry had a tear in his eye but he didn't wipe it away. He was, however, going to perform another ritual tonight, keys be damned, and he was going to make Ali squeal tomorrow morning.

He slipped his things away, catching his breath, utterly seething.

'_Harry,' _Mar suddenly said.

'_Yeah?'_

'_Someone is in your room, looking for your key.'_

Harry's heart, a second before beating furiously, suddenly plummeted.

'_A kid?'_

'_No- an old man.'_

'_No!' _Harry thought furiously. _'The bastard guessed. Mar- can you take it out without him seeing you?'_

'_I can't get into your chest.'_

Harry remembered- he'd put it in his chest, in the emergency compartment, just that morning. He didn't know whether to feel relieved or horrified. He'd decided, for the first day, that he'd leave his trunk as a normal one at the foot of his bed instead of carrying it around shrunken.

'_I wouldn't put it past him to get into it. If he does get in, tell me straight away and I'll activate the emergency ward on it. It won't hold him for long but it should give the bastard a shock.'_

'_He's fiddling with it but he isn't getting in.'_

'_Ok stay there I'll be right up. Keep out of sight.'_

He felt as though his world was closing in. _How could I let myself trust this place? How could I actually make the mistake of leaving my belongings lying around? Shit - shit - shit - you fool, Harry, you damned idiot -_

Harry set off to run the rest of the distance to the castle, in through the doors, into the Entrance Hall and he ran halfway up the stairs before a ringing voice stopped him.

"Mr. Potter!"

He span around and screamed, "_WHAT THE FUCK IS IT NOW?_"

Everything went still for a while. Professor McGonagall's mouth was open as though she had never, in her life, been spoken to in such a way and that if someone did it again she'd kill them on the spot. She didn't say anything for some time, as though she'd been slapped, _hard_.

Harry stood on the stairs, panting, seeing Ali standing next to McGonagall with a huge grin on his feline face.

Then Mar's unearthly, male/female voice echoed around his head.

'_He's opened one of the locks.'_

Harry's heart wasn't beating,

In fact he couldn't hear or see a thing. His eyes were rolled back in his head and his entire consciousness floated as though in warm water.

McGonagall's shouting echoed around the entrance hall- usually, in Hogwarts, when one hears a teacher shredding someone to pieces for behaviour crowds flock to see it, but hearing her voice and the pure, unadulterated fury of her screams sent people running.

Harry didn't hear a word of it.

"_Tectus iniuria_," he whispered to himself, and felt his magic flow.

_That'll hurt him a bit at least,_ he thought absently. _Now to try something else._

He ran up the stairs, feeling like he was flying, and ran towards the staircase room… reaching it in seconds he took the upper stairs at a dead run.

He got to the second floor.

Heading past the Transfiguration Department he continued on, not feeling a thing, unaware of his pants and gasps and his heart's leaping. He could see and hear everything around him acutely.

He got to the out-of-order toilet on the second floor and rocketed in, slamming the door behind him. He'd noticed this on Tuesday in his exploration.

Without a thought, with his blood still up, he knelt on the tiles and screamed aloud as he clasped his hands together in front of his chest, feeling his art run through him like hot water through pipes, feeling it fill and warm him.

He held it, the tiles shaking beneath him and the mirrors cracking, for a few seconds.

He pulled his clasped hands away and a ball of fire erupted in front of him. The breath was knocked so forcefully from his body that he was thrown backwards slightly, landing on his rear on the bathroom floor.

Then things were still.

Harry, breathing heavily and exhausted from the strain he'd just put himself through, sat up gingerly and beheld his chest, two locks clicked open, on the floor of the bathroom in front of him.

* * *

Professor Albus Dumbledore had got one open. 

_How did he get this?_ He thought to himself as he whispered over the trunk. _This has far too much security for a boy of eleven. What is he hiding? I don't believe for a second that Hagrid lost the key- it's too perfect…_

There was movement outside the open window. He turned his head, listening and waiting… _Must have been an owl,_ he thought. He waited for a few seconds longer… _nothing._

He whistled softly to himself as he performed the wandwork, his incantations done for the moment.

A few moments later, a second lock clicked open… and the whole thing went orange.

Professor Dumbledore, reflexes belying his age, removed his hands instantly, unsure.

He stood there for a second. His wand was in his hand. He waited.

The softly glowing trunk lost none of its colour… in fact it got slightly brighter… and yet despite how it glowed it illuminated none of the dark room from where it lay on the bed.

_Is this some other security device? I don't have long… I need to get this open…_

Then Dumbledore's world went orange.

_What in the – _

The shock that burnt his fingertips and jolted his heart wasn't enough to seriously deter him. It hurt, yes, but Albus Dumbledore had suffered more than that in his time.

He lifted his slightly smoking hands, wincing and biting his lip, then looked at the trunk. It still glowed orange. It had looked innocent moments before… now it looked menacing.

Then many things happened at once. Dumbledore would later use his Pensieve to determine what exactly had happened and when.

The orange died and the trunk went back to being its normal leather colour… and something large and black flew in his face before he could move in again.

He shouted out loud in shock and a little pain as the winged creature- whatever it was- went for his eyes.

"_Lumos_!" he shouted, pointing his wand at his face.

It turned out it wasn't a bat- Dumbledore felt its feathery wings still flapping at his face. He felt slightly foolish- his own wandlight had blinded him.

He ducked, rolling to a side, swatting with his hands at his head.

A huge cry rose from the bird as the wandlight left it, the door to the dormitory flew open suddenly, and in the resulting mess of light and confusion the flying thing disappeared.

A beat of silence. Dumbledore rose.

"P – Professor Dumbledore..?"

He flicked his wand as fast as he could, shouting "_Obliviate_!"

Neville Longbottom stumbled backwards as the spell hit him. Dumbledore turned to the chest…

…In time to see it explode.

He tried desperately to put out the flames that covered Harry's bed, succeeding after a moment, but the trunk was gone… it had exploded. In flames.

_What on earth was in it that could be sacrificed to fire that someone breaking into it couldn't see?_ He thought as he moved towards Neville… to find the boy had gone.

He stood there for a heartbeat.

* * *

Harry stood, calming himself down and breathing slowly. He didn't notice the ghost. He tapped his wand on both open locks and they closed. 

"Away," he whispered.

He turned, opened the door and stepped forward… yet again, a fist flew into his face.

"Shit," he cried in fury as he felt himself lift off his feet. He flew backwards slightly, landing where the chest had been, feeling the heat left from it and the throb in his eye.

"You're noisier than a drunken elephant," Ali said, stepping into the bathroom.

Harry said nothing. He got to his feet, shoulders aching, panting like a racehorse. Ali closed and locked the door.

"McGonagall asked me to go get you. She's pretty pissed. I don't think she'll mind if you're a little the worse for wear…"

Harry ducked under the shin-kick, rolling out of reach, but Ali followed him.

Harry couldn't ask questions… he couldn't think… he just tried to survive.

Kick, kick, grab, punch… one in three landed. _Evade him, Harry. Evade – evade – evade… get your bearings, then kill the fucker…_

Ali kicked his dagger out of his hand- it disappeared.

He tried furiously to channel his Art, but after using so much and draining himself in such a way, his body felt nothing at all. He dived under a sink – then he noticed the ghost in the corner screaming – and launched himself up at Ali's chin.

Knocking the boy back and hearing the rattling at the bathroom door, he knew something really bad was about to happen.

He kicked artlessly at Ali's fallen form, catching him in the chin again, then dived away, deliberately not pressing his advantage.

'_Mar,' _he sent desperately. _'Take the keys to London. Stay at Mike's. I'll contact you- don't come back here.'_

He threw his shrunken trunk so it slid along the floor, under the door of a cubicle and behind the bowl. It wasn't as hidden as he'd have liked but he had no time… at least it was an out-of-order toilet.

He stood to realise Ali was behind him.

He was in front of the window and his forehead was acquainted with it as an elbow landed in his neck and sent him crashing forward. His forehead was cut, easily.

He cried out, feeling fists raining down on him, _punch – punch – punch_, and he couldn't move.

He got himself turned around as the door to the room exploded inwards with a dusty bang and a dark shape stepped through.

The stunner hit Ali in the back of the head- the black boy flew forwards into Harry.

Harry crashed, without realising what was happening, out through the window.

Glass tinkered around him, stone rushed past him, night enveloped him… and then the unforgiving ground claimed him with all the subtlety of a bomb going off.

The world went white.

* * *

_What is happening to this place?_ He thought. 

Dumbledore had explained that from his office window he'd seen a fire in the dormitory and had travelled there magically to put it out. Neville, who only recalled seeing Dumbledore battling flames, had backed him up.

He was fine. He had been walking back to his office.

Then Percy Weasley, fifth year prefect, had run into him as flustered as he'd ever been.

"Snape!" he'd screamed. "S - Snape's _killed_ _Potter_!"


	14. The 15 Minute Interval

_Surreal and horrendous chapter to write- more of a filler than anything else._

_Thanks for the reviews, once again- I'm glad this story is making people speculate. It shows it's making an impression on those reading it, and I love the ideas, even if for some of them it's too late- thank you all once more._

_Readers, please, do not imagine that you know a single thing about Ali. The whole point of his character in this stage of the story is that you know _nothing_ about him, who he is, where he comes from, how much experience he has, or anything else... whatever you think, it is very likely wrong. The idea of him being there is for the sake of an antagonist- Harry feels something about him; while suspecting he is a pampered, well-bred little brat, he has a subconscious, primal fear of Ali, he doesn't know why or how and it hinders his abilities when he fights him, whether he's better and more experienced or not. All we know of Ali is that he seems to have it in for Harry... that's what we can gather from his character so far... and he is evidently a bit of a sadist- he's obsessed with causing discomfort and pain in any way he can. Hopefully, Harry will realise that this fear is merely someone being as confident, or more confident, in their abilities than he is, allowing himself to get his mindset right._

_As long as he knows nothing at all about Ali, Ali will continue to kick the shit out of him, because to Harry he is the enigma. Once his mystery is unlocked, once the reason for all of the shit he's putting Harry through is clear, then we'll see how Harry copes._

_Or maybe, in knowing nothing at all about Ali, we (us and Harry) will discover that, actually, Ali is a far more experienced and dangerous person than anyone could have predicted..._

* * *

_Where am I?_

Harry Potter was in an extraordinarily strange place. It had hills and grass, but beneath the grass under his feet it was brickwork. The view faded out in the distance.

And the sky was black.

_Please, God, let this be hell._

He knew it wasn't heaven… in heaven he'd have a chair.

_Do I even believe in that shit?_ He wondered. He stared around him. _Obviously I do._

He sat down on the brickwork/grass, confused and weary, not sure what was happening. He knew he must be dead- he didn't know _how_ he knew that, but it was evident. He'd been killed, somehow. This was the afterlife or purgatory.

He looked at his hands and arms and wasn't surprised to find himself completely naked. He shook his head, tired and bored and upset.

He tried desperately to remember.

_I know I'm Harry Potter. I'm also Shujin. I lived in London. This _isn't_ London. What else do I know? I'm apparently a wizard…_

Some memories returned.

Hazy, like watching his life through stained glass, he saw some things.

_Instead of School or Jail, Fate's decided to simply let me die._

More things occurred- like they were made of smoke. He tried to touch them and they fell apart, drifted into pieces and tendrils escaped, then when he retreated they took form again.

Nothing was clear.

* * *

He was unscathed. He had no scars or markings or anything- he had longer hair… that was it. No tattoo, no earring hole, no rune, no scars… 

He felt his forehead. _No scar._

He nodded at the benefit.

He'd tried to shout and nothing had sounded- his mouth had barely moved. It was like being under water. He wasn't breathing either, yet somehow he stayed alive.

_Or dead. The dead don't breathe._

He stood and began to walk.

* * *

_There must be a way out- this can't be the afterlife. There would be trillions of souls here if it were. Is it a dream..? Or does the divine power have some different, extra-fucked up plan for me?_

He was still walking. He'd been walking for days. He felt no strength leave his legs or body, but his mind was _so_ weary… like the aftermath of a huge headache when one just wants to sleep…

But with no energy being gained or lost, he couldn't sleep.

Walking… walking… following up and down the contours of endless hills.

There were no sunsets or sunrises. The sky stayed black… although there was light enough to see everywhere…

Walking.

Endlessly, tirelessly wandering around this plain.

* * *

_Think Harry!_ He told himself. _How did you get here? How are you getting out?_

He remembered… nothing.

Days passed. He found he remembered tiny things. He occasionally sat down, bored, putting his head in his hands and trying to think.

Ali… He remembered Ali Sumesqi. Third year Ravenclaw. Tall and black and somehow dangerous. He hated Harry- he couldn't think why.

He remembered the bathroom.

Days later he remembered falling through night, splinters of glass glistening around him like stars. He remembered white.

Then this.

_How can I still be thinking and remembering if I'm dead? Am I destined to simply sit here and remember like this? To dwell over my time in life?_

He shook his head, trying to cry but unable to form tears.

* * *

Weeks passed. He walked and walked, bored out of his mind, fighting to remember anything he'd ever read about death. 

Although nobody living knew anything about it.

_But then,_ he thought. _Maybe I'm not dead? Maybe I'm stuck here until I find a way, either further into darkness or back to the light._

He screamed and the sound never echoed. He swore and felt petty.

He explored himself and found himself wanting.

_Forget further darkness. If it's as depressing as this I'm living._

* * *

He experimented as the hours dwindled away. He meditated and found he could, he thought and found he couldn't stop, he tried physical things like running and jumping. 

He ran for a full day.

He tried counting in his head and got bored. He cartwheeled down a hill.

He ran to the top of a hill and jumped, landing and rolling, not feeling a thing. All he felt was the tickle of the grass- no impact, no pain.

He jumped onto his head and found he simply rolled.

He got to his hands and knees and tried to dig- he felt no pain and broke no fingers, he simply couldn't break through the crust of brickwork beneath the grass.

He lay there for hours. Thinking.

_If I lose all will, my will to live and my will to do anything but rot, maybe I'll dwindle? Maybe I'll waste away and find I don't care anymore._

He sat there.

_But I'm Shujin. When have I ever rolled over and taken it? When have I ever not fought? Am I going to be ruled like this? Governed by despair?_

He opened his eyes and looked up into the void.

* * *

Walking…

* * *

He did press ups. Nothing happened to his body but he didn't get tired, and being as bored as he was of aimlessly walking, he thought it might be something to do. 

Then he did sit ups.

Then more press ups.

Then he ran some more.

He practised martial art forms- he punched midair (or whatever the atmosphere was) and kicked and jumped and found himself never tiring, though he knew he should. In life he'd have collapsed days ago.

* * *

_What if I lie down and really concentrate on waking up?_

He did so, closing his eyes, lying there in meditation for a while. Then abruptly, as though he'd had a nightmare, he sat up and opened his eyes.

Empty hills. Black skies. No wind or feeling.

* * *

_I wish I had a drink._

He considered.

_I wish I was thirsty enough to need one._

He tried whistling and was more upset that he couldn't do _that_ as much as anything else. He smiled wryly, or thought he did, wondering why everything suddenly seemed so funny.

_I'm delirious._

He collapsed on the springy ground, laughing like a lunatic, and found to his relief that he was crying. The tears were floating away on the wind.

* * *

He ran some more. 

Up and down and up and down the endless hills, jumping and bucking and screaming, arms outstretched in front of him as though running to embrace the mother he never had.

* * *

Days and days and days and days and days and days… It had been… _what, weeks? Months? Years_ _in the desolate, barren and featureless place? _He had simply gone on and on in his open prison, never tiring, feeling as though his body was invincible and yet for every hit he took physically his mind felt it tenfold. 

Then something happened.

It wasn't so much _lightning_ in the sky ahead- there was no rumble of thunder, and the light didn't flicker but stayed constant.

But there was something. He saw it, eyes wide, and began crawling- then stumbling- then running- then sprinting as fast as he could towards it.

* * *

_Light. Head towards the light._

He was laughing or screaming.

_Go – go – go – go – reach it – light – go –_

And he ran some more. For days.

* * *

It never got bigger. It stayed like it was. 

He ran and ran, body pumping and writhing, for a lifetime.

* * *

Running…

* * *

_I hope I meet God when I get there._

Up and down hills as fast as the wind, heading for the light.

* * *

The light hadn't grown but the horizon had. It had got closer- a block of white and grey. 

_What the fuck is that? An ocean on the edge of this place?_

He ran towards it, it getting bigger at a rate as though he were crawling.

* * *

_This is the size of a mountain range,_ he thought, observing at full speed the cloud that stretched out of view on either side of him, realising he still had miles and miles to go. 

_This reaches up into the sky… yet the light is still there… but when I get closer to the cloud it will disappear._

* * *

He wasn't far now. 

And, what was more important was that he could _feel._

He felt colder as he got closer to the fog.

But at least he was feeling something other than a weary mind.

* * *

He lost sight of the light in the sky. The strange lightning-bolt shape. It had stuck out of the sky like a beacon and he ran towards it, away from the black skies. 

He couldn't see it but he knew it was there.

_I'm coming. I'm coming to the light. Don't you dare disappear._

* * *

He was at the foot of the great cloud. 

He had stopped finally.

He wasn't panting- it was as though he'd merely taken a step forward when in fact he'd galloped over the hills for miles and miles, months and months, and finally he was here with as much energy as he'd had at the start.

_But at least I can feel cold, _he thought. _I'm shivering slightly._

The great white void seemed to suck all the heat into it- it got chillier the closer he got. The clouds billowed and pulsed like a sheet in the wind- at one moment you could see fifty feet of ground, the next moment just five. It seemed to pull at Harry like an ocean tide.

Harry turned around; looking back where he'd come from, he found it was as though he was looking up a very steep hill made up of smaller hills. He tried to take a step up it but nearly lost his balance.

Shujin, in the face of an obstacle he wasn't allowed back up on when living on Earth, would have found a way up anyway. But this wasn't Earth and he somehow knew that, despite feeling irritated that a decision had been made for him, there was in no way a method of conquering this.

He turned again.

Spreading his arms wide, closing his eyes, unsure what he'd face as he was smothered in the freezing cloud of whatever adventure death had cooked up for him, he plunged forward.

Then he was gone into the mists, and the black-skied plain and the brickwork hills were still.

* * *

Severus Snape felt strangely empty. 

It was in a slow, smudging blur that he saw the black boy pitch forwards. He saw him impact Potter, then saw Potter shoot backwards through the floor-to-ceiling panelled window.

He'd seen him plummet, his young face emotionless as he'd fallen out of sight, glass tumbling after him like raindrops.

The Ravenclaw hit the floor with a sick _thwack_, and then everything regained its normal velocity suddenly.

He listened- he heard the ghost sobbing faintly, the sounds of pipes behind the walls, the sounds of footsteps behind him… then he heard it. _Potter hitting the dirt._

He stood, like an empty, fragile eggshell, not entirely sure what was going on.

He lowered his wand.

"Professor Snape! Have you found… what – what's happened? What on Earth-"

Professor McGonagall stepped into view, trailed by two prefects and the Head Girl.

"That's Mr. Sumesqi. Where's Potter, Professor?"

She looked at him. She saw his black eyes, his wand in his hand, the completely blank face he wore, and beheld something she didn't think she'd ever see in him.

Uncertainty.

"Professor Snape..?"

The Head Girl immediately walked over to Ali Sumesqi on the floor- Snape followed her peripherally- and the others went into the bathroom, looking for Merlin knew what.

"Fell," Snape said faintly, still feeling a complete lack of anything.

"Who did?" McGonagall asked. "Potter? Fell where? Fe-"

Suddenly her face drained of all colour. She frowned, he wasn't sure why, and turned away from him towards the window. She didn't move forwards. She just stood there.

A redheaded prefect stepped towards the window, closely followed by a colleague, and stared out into the darkness. They both then stared downwards for a long time.

Professor McGonagall said, "Potter _fell_, Snape? Onto – to where? Off what? Surely – surely he…"

"I stunned Sumesqi," Snape made his voice work. "He was attacking – attacking Potter. He flew into him."

"And?" McGonagall prompted sharply- dangerously.

"Oh, _Merlin!_" the redhead Gryffindor screamed. "He's – there's a body! There's a body at the bottom!"

There was a moment of silence. Nobody made a sound.

"Weasley," McGonagall said quietly. "Fetch the Headmaster. Andrews, help Miss Cleve take that boy to the Hospital wing."

When they were gone, she rounded on Snape.

"And _you,_" she said bitingly, the most vicious he'd ever heard her. "You _pray._"

* * *

Harry had never flown. He imagined, though, that this must be what it is like to pass through a cloud. 

He'd realised eventually that he was actually _breathing_- he'd started again without even noticing, but he could feel now the sharp cold of the fog he was in stinging his lungs as he took a breath.

Blowing into the fog, as hard as he could manage, did about as much as shouting at it. It billowed and swelled and pulsed around him as though it was some living thing, but it did not relent in any way he could make it. He stumbled through, on and on, blind and cold and beginning to regret his decision to plunge into the fog.

_Just think about the light,_ he told himself. _The light. That's where I'm heading._

Looking up as he was he didn't notice something in front of him. If he'd seen it he wouldn't have believed it was actually there anyway.

He tripped onto his face.

The floor in front of his eyes he registered had changed at some point in his wandering- it wasn't the strange black brick and grass… it was like a wet, shiny marble now. As though it were a piece of thick white glass lit from the inside.

But he wasn't paying attention to the floor. He staggered to his feet, finding his balance, and he turned to see what he'd fallen over.

It was a pile of black robes.

_What the fuck?_ He thought blandly. _Wizard robes in this shitty place?_

He didn't know if he was supposed to put them on, but feeling as cold- and now slightly _wet_- as he did, he thought it might be a good idea.

As soon as he picked them up he regretted it.

The moment the last strand of cloth left the strange floor the living fog around him suddenly retreated for the barest second, and then sharply _plunged forwards_. Strangely, Harry did not pass through the fog this time- he was knocked backwards as though he'd been hit with a solid object. He left his feet.

From his position on his back, the robes on the ground next to him, he decided that it might not be such a good idea to touch things he finds on the floor in the afterlife.

He stood, the fog having gone back to its normal intrusive, pulsing self.

He then fell over again when he saw who stood in front of him. He felt his heart racing as he stared at the figures there, not moving or blinking or breathing.

There was a moment of startled incomprehension.

"Mum?" he croaked.

* * *

It had taken about thirty minutes to locate where Harry had fallen. The window of the out-of-order bathroom looked over a side of the castle with no doors- below it was grassy rocks and a hill that fell away into the lake. 

Dumbledore was grateful Harry hadn't plunged into the lake- they'd have never seen him again if he'd rolled any further than he had over the sharp mounds.

The way they'd got him back into the castle had been risky but necessary- he couldn't be carried or levitated up, over the rocks from a distance, and yet the nurse could hardly see to him where he lay. In the end they'd used the start-of-term boats.

Hagrid had sat in a boat below the outcrop that overhung the water, then Professor McGonagall and Dumbledore himself had between them lowered Harry, using levitation, gently down into the boat. He was completely still and had been as 'cold as the rocks themselves,' as Hagrid put it.

Hagrid had been distraught at what had happened- his eyes were glistening as he stubbornly refused to let McGonagall levitate Harry up the stairs and into the castle. He'd carried the boy up himself, cradled in his arms, as fast as he could go while not jostling Harry too much.

At present they were making their brisk way towards the Hospital wing, through the corridors of the castle, the occasional student watching the procession with wide, confused and conspiratorial eyes.

The Head boy and girl met them half way. McGonagall, striding purposefully, had had sharp words with them about who exactly they'd told and asking them what the students were saying about it. Dumbledore wasn't listening.

Staring at Harry Potter, cradled in the giant's arms, he felt a pull at his heart that made him feel as though, despite having been nowhere near him, he had something to do with what had happened.

Harry was alive, but he was very battered, and obviously had some very serious injuries under his robes. He'd also been alone and unconscious in the dark on the cold rocks, being sprayed by the lake's waves breaking, for nearly an hour.

It was all very surreal. He tried to organise a plan in his head.

_While waiting for Mr. Sumesqi to recover, I'll take the statements of Minerva and Severus. Find out the sequence of events that led him to be where he was,_ he decided. _Then I'll talk to Ali Sumesqi and finally I'll get Poppy's verdict._

"Hagrid," Dumbledore said, still walking beside the big man. "I trust you to see that Mr. Potter reaches the Hospital wing. Minerva, please find Professor Snape and bring him to my office, so I can find out from the both of you the sequence of events."

"Aye," Hagrid said, walking ahead.

"And Hagrid," Dumbledore called after him, "See that nobody disturbs Harry." He turned to the Head Boy and Girl, saying, "As soon as Mr. Sumesqi has recovered, bring him from the Hospital Wing straight to my office. You have the password."

He got a chorus of 'Yes sir's, or an equivalent, so began to walk to his office. He tried to clear his head, but that was the problem- absolutely nothing was clear.

* * *

Harry had never seen a picture of his parents- he should have no idea what they look like- but he instinctively knew that the man and woman in front of him, looking out straight into the distance over Harry's head, were them. 

"Mum – dad?" he called again, unsure and confused and more upset than he'd admit.

The fog pulsed and swept in between him and them, and suddenly they were gone.

"NO!" he screamed, lurching off his feet and diving into the fog where they'd been.

He ran, changing direction and outstretching his arms and spinning around in fury and confusion and hopelessness, flailing about as he tried to locate them.

_They were just here!_ He thought furiously. _Mum and dad! They were just fucking here- where have they gone? Why did the fog get rid of them, why didn't they stay?_

"_Where are you_?" he screamed out loud.

Making noises of desperation and horror he tried to find them, until suddenly he caught a glimpse of a figure cloaked in black.

Running forwards, he saw a glimpse of a black cloak again to his left, and he went towards it.

The fog cleared and Harry stopped dead in his tracks.

Albus Dumbledore stood before him.

_What the fuck is going on?_ He wondered, his mind not processing properly.

Dumbledore disappeared as the fog billowed. Harry fought down frustration- this must be a dream. Or some weird thing people in the afterlife go through, to do with their memories.

He sat on the ground, completely lost with no idea at all what to do.

As the hours passed people appeared and disappeared to Harry in a way that terrified him- people he never even remembered nowadays- the old dentist, the school nurse, the Dursleys, other people he didn't recognise and other people he barely remembered, kids from the streets of London, the school's teachers, Mike, Mundungus Fletcher, students from the school, members of the Marksmen, then suddenly Harry burst into tears.

Mito Nobunaga stood before him.

"Now, I teach you all I know," the figure said to him without moving his lips. Harry didn't realise, but it was actually _him_ saying it.

Harry got up, on the verge of screaming, and stumbled towards his sensei with his arms outstretched. Sure enough, the white screen blew between them and the sensei disappeared. He fell forwards and thumped his fists against the cool, white, glowing surface that was the floor.

Harry then had his attention caught by something that was actually moving- he looked up, vision blurred with misery, and saw his raven Mar flying overhead in the mist. Harry shielded his eyes from the glare of the brighter, higher fog, before realising that it wasn't the fog he was seeing- it was the bright light, the stationary thunderbolt that had drawn him into this nightmare in the first place.

He got up steadily, gritted his teeth and ran, hollering at the top of his lungs with his arms over his face, furious and terrified and confused and simply wanting to get through this nightmare.

He ran and ran and ran, barely conscious of a bunch of people around him, until after a few hours something novel happened.

He collided with one of them.

He stumbled back with a cry, hand on his _bleeding_ forehead, looking up in dazed abhorrence at the tall, dark man standing in front of him. He had neat hair, was handsome and quite short, but his striking feature was his eyes.

They were red and narrow.

Harry looked away, pulling his hand from his forehead- he saw blood. _I'll scar from that,_ he thought absently. He got up and tried to keep going, and for once the figure didn't disappear. It followed him with its eyes, turning its head, unnerving him.

It was out of sight soon enough.

As he kept going, trudging through the now-viscous, freezing cloud like it was fallen snow, he felt a lot of pain. It wasn't a sudden influx of agony; he noticed small things happening one by one, a nick on his arm, a cut on his chest, things that had no reason for happening to him yet did anyway.

He gritted his teeth harder, fighting the growing ache in his skin and muscles, stumbling through the cloud that was now- instead of being clear until about ten feet away from him like it had been before- so thick and so close to him he couldn't see his hand in front of his face.

Onwards and onwards.

He saw nobody else for days.

* * *

On the third morning after Harry had been forced into his coma, the strange happenings that had wracked the boy's body came to an end. 

Dumbledore hadn't been able to stay for long- he had a school to run- so after Ali Sumesqi had been let out of the hospital wing on the first morning, he'd left himself. He received twice-daily reports on Harry's condition from the ever-vigilant Madam Pomfrey and the news had not been good.

Apparently, as her initial report had suggested, the way Harry had been found had been the most eerily worrying of all. He was, apart from being unconscious, completely unharmed. The only strange exception to this was an intrictate, complex scar on his arm... Dumbledore knew what it was, not which animal, but what exactly it did... it was an Animal Rune, a messy, tainted ritual designed to give some fickle power to the user. He wondered if Harry knew what it was, or what the dangers in having one were.

_Where did he get it_? he wondered to himself. _Could this prove my theory about someone introducing him to magic- albeit unsavoury magic- before he was enrolled here?_

It was so faint Madam Pomfrey had missed it on her first inspection of Harry's body, it being nearly the same colour as the unharmed skin around it.

This had confused the matron and Dumbledore to no ends- one does not get hurled from a second storey window to plummet onto sharp rocks and not end up with a single new scratch upon them- his scars and markings, excluding his forehead's famous one, were all obviously very old, and not the sort gained from long falls but more from blade nicks and broken bones when he was very young.

Harry's body had refused all potions and charms to try to revive him, and because he hadn't been registering injured the matron had seen fit to stop trying, not even restrain him, and let him come-to when he woke naturally.

Then the fits had started.

Spontaneously, Harry had begun suffering from spasms, seizures and gaping wounds, screaming horrendously every so often with absolutely no reason for it. With no explanation his skin would rupture and begin to bleed, then suddenly knit itself back together within a few moments. Although he was not moving, for all his struggles, from the cot he was strapped into and not ingesting a single thing, he managed to increase his bodyweight and muscle mass as though he were in brutal training for a marathon. His arms, legs and torso grew.

On the first evening his screams had abruptly cut off- a harassed Madam Pomfrey had bustled into his cordoned area to find that Harry's neck had snapped. Then, about a minute later, the bone had healed itself to as unharmed as it had been before.

Harry's cries became more distant as the days progressed, less desperate, but somehow the more horrific for it. His screams had primarily been jargon that nobody had understood, but then on the second evening he'd said a single word.

'Mum?'

And then he'd begun screaming dozens of names, each one separated by a few minutes of fitful silence. Dumbledore's had been third.

Albus had suffered endless questioning from the student body, but because nobody who was supposed to know really knew what was going on, he'd been forced to tell them as much truth as he knew himself. Apart from the bit about Snape- rumours were abound that would hurt the man enough, despite the fact that the fall was an accident.

Albus Dumbledore had no choice but to wait for Harry's strange coma to pass.

He prayed that it would, though somehow he knew that Harry wouldn't just die on him.

The self-mutilation then self-healing that Harry was unconsciously performing were the things that struck him the most- his mind was experiencing something so strange and so powerful- and so _horrific_- that it was physically taking effect, then in the same way but in reverse his mind was healing him of everything. It was unlike anything he'd ever seen before.

Wandless healing was renowned for being the hardest branch of magic to perform, although it was one of the most natural- the human body was designed to heal itself of about half of the possible injures that could befall it. Skin rewove itself but left scars, bones reset on their own but at bad angles, and even hair and nails grew on when cut. However, the sort of accelerated healing Harry was performing on himself on the injuries that appeared on him was supposed to be almost impossible- it was a practise that was a mystery to Dumbledore himself.

After first hearing of it, he'd contacted two people- Nicholas Flamelle, his close friend and one famous for- among other things- being able to heal himself and those close to him slowly without a wand, and also an Italian companion of his from many years before he'd been a teacher who was known as Marco Impiri.

Marco was a vampire.

Nicholas' response had been predictable, and Dumbledore had agreed that if Harry was still in the situation after a week that he and his wife could examine him at their leisure. Marco's had been less so, but then that was why Dumbledore had contacted him.

Vampires were one of the few species that were, despite lessened amounts of raw magical power, able to magically heal themselves of surface injuries almost as quickly as they got them. It was not a skill dependant on the power of the user, or even the intuitive skill, but on the natural energy within them. However, according to Marco, such a skill was not possible in someone who did not have traces of immortal blood in them. Such people included Fae (Veela, leprechauns and centaurs) and classic 'Dark Creatures' (Vampires, Werewolves and the like).

Terrified yet pessimistic, Dumbledore had asked Snape to test Harry for such blood using a blood clot on his school robes. To his surprise and relief- and further confusion- the results were negative. Harry was not a vampire, or any other magical creature.

_So why and how is he doing this?_

However, as said, once the third morning had arrived Harry had gone completely back to normal. He lay there as still and calm and asleep as anything. He showed no adverse readings, though he still did not accept anything Madam Pomfrey tried to give him.

The last three names he'd uttered had upset Madam Pomfrey greatly, though Dumbledore had been grateful- it had appeared as though they did not have long to wait until Harry rejoined them.

The first name had been 'Voldemort.'

The second had been 'Harry Potter.'

At this point, Harry Potter's prone form had unconsciously, spontaneously burst into harmless, tickling yet terrible-looking flames.

The final name before his silence, dulled by the roar of the fire, had been 'Shujin.'

* * *

He was staring into darkness. Nearly his entire body was covered in blood and scar tissue. In front of him, on the lip of the chasm, stood _himself_. 

The other Harry wasn't a mirror image- not only did it not move when he did, it looked nothing like him nowadays. Had Harry been thinking straight he'd have recognised himself in the mirror of the Dursleys' hallway at seven years of age.

Other Harry looked small, weak, frightened and insignificant. There shone a faint determination behind his green eyes. That Harry still wore glasses- Harry reached up to his own face and felt there. He was wearing a beanie-hat, his earring, his long leather coat and his katana… but no glasses. He couldn't remember the last time he'd worn them.

He shook his head and turned away. Things seemed to be moving very slowly. Once the fog had lifted he'd found that, apart from he and his younger-self apparition, the huge expanse of shining black rock on which they stood was deserted. Unlike the previous transformation of the ground from brickwork/grass to white marble, which had gone unnoticed, Harry had been staring at the floor as it had mulled and fogged from the inside out, going very slightly grey, greyer, then eventually a dull, lifeless black.

With the fog went the cold and Harry was now feeling extremely hot. Too hot. He kept seeing the eyes of that 'death eater' as Dumbledore had called him. His eyes that stayed on his until they'd melted in their face… he'd burst into flames when Harry had clapped his hands.

Harry fought against clapping his hands again.

He walked forwards; he didn't know why, his back still to his lifeless younger self, but he did. He found himself walking into a pool of water- a huge, swelling expanse of blackness that lapped at his feet like ink- you couldn't tell where the rock stopped and the sea began.

He kept walking.

His knees were submerged… then his hips… his trenchcoat he could picture splayed out behind him like a crescent spotlight. _But I'm not wearing a trenchcoat anymore…_

He could see stars.

He looked up, feeling the cool liquid void reach his neck over his shoulders, and smiled.

Then he submerged. He couldn't walk- he couldn't swim- he couldn't even move. He hung there in the blackness, the chilling current carrying him somewhere but he didn't know where… he was still smiling… his mouth opened to say something and the blackness poured in…

He coughed, swallowed, and drowned.

He felt himself sinking slowly… the black was hazy in his vision, like a smear of mud across a windscreen… but he looked up and saw the light of the surface. Before he left, before he died, he kicked and reached for it, but the light was only getting fainter…

_Can I see stars?_

No he couldn't. But standing as he was, looking into the pool again, or even flying miles above it, he leaned forwards and could see his own reflection.

"Shujin," he whispered into the growing white.


	15. The Important Guest

_I'm pretty ill at the moment and I'm fighting my internet provider for some decent rates- they cut off my internet a little while ago, which is why I've not been able to post. I apologise to anyone waiting for the next chapters, I'm posting this from a mate's computer so I don't really have time to go into detail. Hope you enjoy, and I'm terribly sorry about the wait- it's fucked up my_ _weekly posts quite impressively. I'll see if I can borrow a mate's computer again next week because I'm not sure if my internet is going to work out... I might have to change my provider completely, which is even more time taken._

_Anyway, sorry for the wait, this is nowhere near abandoned- the plot is about half-thick currently and a couple of answers will be surfacing soon, I hope you enjoy what I can get around to posting over the next few weeks._

_Take care, cheers for sticking it out, G.L._

* * *

He awoke to a different kind of black.

He recognised the hospital wing from the moonlight pouring through the windows. His eyes felt pained and his head was pounding infrequently, as though there was something in it that was anxious to escape.

He groaned aloud, tired and aching, wondering what the hell had happened to him.

He found himself strapped into one of the cots of the Hogwarts Hospital wing, somehow feeling much bigger and… stronger… and over the next few hours he began to remember everything.

He used his art to gently pry open the straps of leather, his whole body in pain and allowing him to utilise it effectively. Instead of accessing his centre- the floating, weightless and painless state of mind he was so familiar with- he allowed himself to feel everything as he rose. He was weak. He couldn't stand up straight.

_What day is it?_ He wondered. _And how did I get here… and how can I feel so tired after so many years of sleep?_

The office door at the end of the ward suddenly flung open, and the nurse bustled out, seeing him standing- or rather leaning on the edge of his cot- swaying.

The Madam Pomfrey from his coma shot into his head with a jolt, and for no reason, he was suddenly feeling absolutely furious.

"Mr. Potter!" She exclaimed. Harry closed his eyes. "You _are_ awake – what are you doing up!? Get back into bed- you… you…"

She was silenced by the look on his face.

"What day is it?" He demanded suddenly, his voice cracking ever-so slightly.

"Uh – Wednesday. September 11th," she stuttered, unsure of herself suddenly.

_I've been out for… 4 days? 5? How strange,_ He thought. _I was wrong…_ He saw red suddenly.

"_And_," he fought for energy, his voice shaking with both exhaustion and rage, "Which one of the excuses for teachers in this school threw me out of a window?"

"Mr. Potter- I don… do you remember what happened?"

"I decided to see if the night was pleasant enough for a fly. _Yes,_ you horse-faced fuck, I remember what happened. Who stunned me?"

"_Mr. Potter_!" She screeched in horror.

"Answer me."

"I – I can… Professor Du-"

"_Just_ answer my question, and then we can all go back to bed."

Pomfrey built up her courage, saying strongly, "Professor Dumbledore will be along in the morning, Harry – he'll answer – he needs to talk to – do you have _any_ idea what you went through while in your coma? I've never…"

"Yes, I happen to recall it very well. The scars covering my body were of course no clue at all. _Fuck you_. I'm glad to see that the Hogwarts matron is able to heal people in her care… or rather, I _will_ be glad when I see some fucking evidence of it. Has Ali Sumesqi been expelled?"

"Wha – Mr. Potter!" she moaned, actually covering her ears with her hands.

"I take that as a no. Good. Because I'm going to kill him. Then I'm going to try to kill the person who tried to kill me. Send Dumbledore over at his earliest convenience, you fucking stupid wench, and get out of my sight."

Madam Pomfrey burst into tears, completely in shock.

"Now I'm going to sleep," Harry said wearily, his viciousness evaporated. "Please go away."

With that, he collapsed on the floor.

* * *

"That's ridiculous," Lucius spluttered indignantly. 

"I know."

"You cursed him out of a window and he _lives?_"

"Yes, Malfoy," Snape said tiredly. "That's what I said."

Lucius' head, suspended in the flames, shook in bewilderment. Snape took another long sip of whiskey.

"Whatever will it take to kill the little fucker?"

"Lucius," Snape said, patience wearing thin. "It was an accident. My job might well be on the line because of it."

He didn't mention that in stunning Ali Sumesqi, he'd actually hoped to save the Potter boy's life. That didn't need to be said. It had gone terribly wrong anyway.

"Of course," the head grinned. "An accident. Because accidents- like plummeting onto the rocks from a second storey window- happen all the time. Come, Severus… surely you don't feel _bad_ about it?"

"If I lose my job from this…"

"Find another. Get your Potions Mastery. Get a social life," the head snorted. "Or go on a rampage and slaughter muggles. All of them work for me."

"You're a dolt, Lucius, you know that."

"Thank you," the head said, but with steelier look in its eyes now.

"How," Snape hissed, "Do you expect me to gain information from Dumbledore if he no longer trusts me?"

Lucius considered with a frown.

"Save his life again. It doesn't matter- you know he's as soft as century old, greying putty. Tell him you're very, very sorry and that it won't happen again. Buy him some socks."

"If you aren't going to take this seriously I shall close the fire."

"Don't bother- I need to go now anyway. The idea of Harry Potter tumbling to an early grave has turned me on somewhat- I'm going to go and ravage Narcissa. Have a marvellous evening."

The head disappeared and the flames died. Severus hated it when Lucius was in a good mood. He also didn't know whether his parting remarks had been a joke or not.

He pulled some holiday assignments over to him, rubbing his eyes, and picked up a quill. He was feeling particularly nasty this evening.

* * *

"Harry?" He asked again. 

Harry Potter was staring out of the hospital wing window. He was enraptured by a grey sunrise. He was not at all in the mood for company- this was his second-most appreciated sunrise ever, despite the greyness of it... he didn't know he could actually feel the same way he had that day on the rooftop a second time.

He was trying to savour it.

"Madam Pomfrey," Dumbledore was saying, "Refuses to treat you, or even tell me what you said to distress her so much."

"Look at me," Harry said absently. "Do I need healing?"

His Art had cleaned him up rather nicely in the hours before dawn.

"Well we can't know for certain without Madam Pomfrey's inspection, Harry, but… well, we're all grateful for your apparent recovery, my boy."

Harry gave a bark of laughter, looking at Dumbledore finally. He was the splitting image of the one he'd seen while in a coma- the only changes he could see were the robes and, astonishingly, what looked like real emotion on his face.

"No, Headmaster, you are relieved that you don't have to do too much paperwork over this. _I_ am truly grateful."

Albus looked saddened, saying, "Do you really think that Harry?"

Harry looked at him blandly. His hospital clothes itched and thinking about it, it gave him a splendid idea.

"Could you organise that someone bring me my trunk, please, Headmaster. If I consent to stay in the hospital wing, I'll do it in my own clothes."

_Let's see you worm your way out of this one._

The headmaster didn't even blink as he smoothly said, "Of course, Harry. You agree to stay for a little while then?"

"We'll see."

"Then I'll have someone bring your things. When I have consoled Madam Pomfrey to the point of direct contact with you again, she'd like to take you through our observations of your unconscious state. You were – you had some very unusual things happen to you."

"I would hope that the circumstances of me being unconscious weren't considered usual."

"No," Dumbledore said with an apologetic smile. "They weren't. It was a horrible and unexpected accident."

"Ok," Harry said. _What fucking accident was there? _He narrowed his eyes. "You aren't going to tell me who did it?"

"What do you mean?" The Head asked distractedly, examining his glasses.

"Don't fu – don't _treat me_ like an _idiot_, please," he bit. "Are you going to tell me who threw the stunner that resulted in my near-death impact?"

"How much do you remember?"

"Assume I remember who did it and I'm testing you."

The Head smiled, but it was colder this time. "It doesn't work like that, Harry," he said. "But if you knew who performed the spell I'd love to hear who- I can't get a straight tale out of any witnesses."

Harry shook his head, looking out the window again.

"If you tell me the truth I'll tell you the truth. That way was working fine til you tried to poison me last time."

Harry knew the old man hadn't tried to poison him, but he liked saying it. He had no way of knowing what the hell he was trying to give him.

"_Harry_!"

"_Assume_," Harry said loudly, cutting him off. "That I have no idea but would _really_ love to know."

"I can't tell you, Harry."

"But you do know who?"

"Yes."

"Alright. Nothing's secret in this school for long. I'll find out. Thanks for the time, Headmaster," he said, not bothering to sound earnest, "but I'd love my clothes and books from my trunk. My wand would be good too, please."

"And the dagger you had in your belt?" The head asked quietly.

"Yes," Harry said, without missing a beat. "That too."

There was a moment's pause.

"Your… _things_… should have been sent to your dormitory, Harry. I'll have them all sent down to you. We'll – talk – at some point about the finer ethical points of bringing weapons into school."

_Not that my 'unethical' weaponry did any fucking good. All my life people have been trying to kill me- Voldemort for reasons unknown, my beloved family in Surrey because I was a 'freak', people in London who took a disliking to me… why would it be any different here?_

"Alright," Harry said with a sigh. "Cheers."

He closed his eyes and laid back. When the door closed he thought of Dumbledore explaining away his 'missing' trunk, and felt himself smile.

* * *

He'd been in there, awake, for a week. 

Harry was feeling a multitude of different emotions at various points but the main one that stuck in his head was that of _boredom._ He was going stir-crazy without his things being available to him- he still remembered where he'd hidden them, sliding the trunk at the last second behind a cubicle's toilet, and he prayed that nobody had moved them or found it by chance.

He also knew he wouldn't be able to go and get his things until he was well clear of all school scrutiny.

Dumbledore's response had been typically bullshit, Harry recalled with amusement. The Headmaster had entered and recounted a tragic story of, the second Harry hit the rocks, his trunk bursting into spontaneous flames in his dormitory and nearly burning it down. His things had disappeared. Harry fought down a biting correction of the sequence of events, and kicked up a huge fuss, as he knew he would have had it actually happened.

"That'd only happen if someone tried to break into it!" He'd screamed. "Who the fuck was trying to get into my case? All my shit's just _self-destructed_, then!?"

All he'd got back was his wand, which he'd had on him. He let the lack of dagger slide, for the moment.

He'd also remembered to contact Mar. The bird was safe in Mike's flat in London, being as worried as a Raven could be about Harry. It said that Mike had some messages for him and had grown frustrated that Mar wouldn't leave, despite being under direct instruction to not.

'_Talk to him,'_ Harry had told it. _'That way you can be a direct communicator between us.'_

Mike hadn't been in at that time, so Harry was waiting until he was again before further developing Mar's usefulness to him.

He was thinking about how much he was crippling himself by not having had a cigarette in nearly two _weeks_, lying in his hospital bed in the middle of the night in his uncomfortable clothes, bored and frustrated and furious, when the door at the far end of the ward opened.

Someone had come into the hospital wing from the main school.

He didn't want to talk to most of the people it might be, including the nurse, who wouldn't meet his eyes, Dumbledore, any single Gryffindor, Malfoy, Ali, Snape, or any other teacher. Apart from the fact it was past midnight, he simply wasn't in the mood.

He closed his eyes and steadied his breathing, entering his centre to make him more aware of things happening around him. He felt, rather than heard, the footsteps making their stealthy way up the aisle of the ward. He could feel their warm breath, their body heat and their heartbeat…

He used the tried and true techniques that his Sensei had taught him- _Walking Like Shadow_ had not only instructed the pupil on stepping silently, but included how to identify people by their walk. By the weight of their feet you could tell their build, the length of their strides could tell you their height, the speed was their determination, the volume their intent. You could go so far as to identify the sex of some by interpreting which part of the foot was placed down first.

It was a student, he decided. Either that or it was Professor Flitwick. But the charms teacher didn't breathe as heavily as this person, and didn't have the body mass. They were any age between his own and 15, judging by height and weight. They were attempting to be quiet, going slowly but determinedly.

Harry waited. He thought he knew already who it might be.

Just before the curtains opened he could smell them, and he recognised them without doubt. He opened his mouth with a breath to speak.

"You're terrible at sneaking up on people, Ali."

The curtain opened. He heard a pair of lips draw back in a smile, and left his centre.

"I wasn't trying to, Harry Potter."

"Sure you weren't," Harry said, opening his eyes and focusing on the silhouette that was this boy- coma Ali's face and expression filled in the darkness. "I'm surprised you weren't expelled. Oh, no, wait- this is Hogwarts we're talking about. Did you get a medal?"

"I'm surprised to see you awake."

"You hadn't heard?"

"Dumbledore's keeping the school in suspense. We're all anxious for our little hero to return to us," he said without emotion.

Harry said nothing for a while, but then grew unwillingly uneasy.

"You come to finish the job, Ali Sumesqi?"

"Don't dare say my surname," the boy said simply. "And, 'No' is the answer to that question. You'll be standing high enough to fall at the end. Unlike _some_, I have honour."

"Yet you sneak in here when you think I'm unconscious."

There was a sharp intake of breath. Ali hissed something but Harry didn't understand it.

"Let me ask," Harry said. "Why do you have it in for me? Have I fucked you over somehow without knowing? I can't believe someone as complicated as you could just be a bully. Why pull all this 'sparring' bullshit and not just come clean? For some reason, you want me dead. It will inevitably get you killed, but I want to know why."

"_You_," Ali said coldly. "You will find out soon enough."

"I'm really not a good person to mess about. Eventually I'll get weary of you being a little bitch and _shoot you in the face_. Grow the fuck up."

Ali's silhouette slowly bowed.

"As you wish, Harry Potter," he said. Harry frowned. "I shall grow up. _You_, however, will not be given the chance."

He turned on his heel and walked out of the curtains. Harry heard nothing then, and if he'd heard breathing he'd have believed Ali simply stood outside his bed curtains. He picked up his wand, concentrating on locating him.

There was a rustle from further into the ward- a curtain ring clinking lightly against the rail. Harry pointed his wand.

The door between the school and the infirmary then slammed.

Harry stayed with his wand pointed at the curtain until he heard the nurse come out at dawn, four hours later. He'd later recall that he'd not been so vulnerable since becoming Shujin. He'd then decide to forget about it.

* * *

Harry got up and walked out of the hospital wing that day. The Nurse didn't even try to stop him. He didn't dare want to try to transfigure his clothes with his wand, so put on the robes he'd been wearing when he'd fallen, grimacing at but ultimately ignoring the blood on them. 

Walking through the corridors a second year had said, 'Is it his ghost?' to which Harry had smiled.

_Shujin's back_, he thought.

He went to Gryffindor Tower, thankful that lessons had begun and not many students were around, heading straight through his common room and up to his dorm. There was no evidence of any fire, though Harry knew there must have been.

Neville was asleep in bed.

Harry sighed, going to the window and looking at the sun to determine the time. Frowning, he walked to Neville's bed.

"Hey," he said. The boy stirred. "You're supposed to be in Herbology."

Neville woke in a start, rushing with muted noises about, congratulating Harry on being ok and fretting about oversleeping. Harry regretted waking him purely because he knew the school would know now, but realised they'd find out anyway.

_Now- do I go to lessons?_ He wondered.

Neville stopped at the door and looked at him, bag over his shoulder, questioning.

There were a few moments of silence.

"See you later Nev," Harry said, collapsing on his bed.

When he awoke, he found a letter on his nightstand telling him that Dumbledore had taken the liberty of re-ordering his school supplies on behalf of Hogwarts as an apology for the trunk malfunction and the window incident. He began to think about his trunk... and also about the strange world he'd lived in after falling out of the window.

* * *

"_No_," he shouted for the last time. "I ain't seen him or met him. _You've_ asked me four times; I've been asked every single fuckin' day since the start of September, for _fuck's sake_, I don't know nothin'!" 

The small man jumped backwards in shock.

"Excuse _me_, sir! This is a routine check- Harry Potter was a missing person for _four years_, and suddenly he appears in wizarding London! Ollivander has admitted to knowing about him, and someone of the description was seen in the area, so we are required by law to ask!"

Mike Chow frowned.

"Four years? Coulda sworn he's supposed to be older… weren't it nineteen eighty or summit?"

The man seemed to realise he'd slipped up.

"Oh – oh, er – well, perhaps, yes, ten years. He was missing for ten. Of course. Well – well if you remember anything, be sure to Owl my department."

"Oi," Mike said before he went anywhere. "If e's shown up by now, why all the fuss? If e's lost still I'd understan' it, but e's alive an' back wiv us, so what's the big fuckin' search for?"

The man swelled up with dignity.

"Well," he said. "Harry Potter lived as a muggle for years- and that's F O R years, not the number," he corrected quickly. "He lived among them for a long time. No wizard is reported to have introduced him into the magical world. This means one of two things- either he has, as a muggle, stumbled upon our world by accident and realised he fitted in- which would be a _travesty; _what if any old muggle could wander in off the street? But anyway- either _that_ or a wizard became his _illegal_ guardian and showed him into this world."

Mike nodded sagely.

"You, mate," he said. "You shouldn't believe everythin' yer boss tells you. Now get the fuck off my doormat."

He slammed the door and stood for a second in silence.

He went and used his wand to pour himself a cup of tea, tired and grumpy, wearing a frilly pink bathrobe. It was his favourite for the very reason that it _so_ didn't go with who he was- a creased, hardened half-Asian, covered in tattoos with mob connections... in a pink bathrobe.

He was debating on whether or not to do his morning calming exercises, or whether to go back to bed where his assistant Gemma was asleep and get some different exercise, when the door buzzer went again.

He looked up at the ceiling, reigning in his rampant temper, and grabbed his wand while storming to the front door of his flat.

"What did I tell you, you _stupid bastard_," he bellowed, swinging open the door and pointing his wand.

There was a second of silence.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" he asked, fighting not to gulp in shock.

"Nice to see you again too, Chow. Can I come in?" Rebecca Hume asked, stepping forwards anyway as Mike lowered his wand.

"I don't work for you no more," he said dumbly.

"Nice dressing gown, Chow. Are you this good at hosting to every girl who comes in here?"

At that point Gemma, the tattooed, pierced and dreadlocked secretary, walked in wrapped in his bed sheets.

"Who's this?" she asked.

"Go back to bed, girl," he said shortly. He turned to Rebecca, knowing his assistant would obey him.

"Obviously your charm works better on some girls than others."

"What're you doin' here, Miss Hume? I don't… I told you all I didn't want no more to do wiv you. I ain't a – a private commission no more."

"Mike, we don't want your services in that way. Why don't we sit down and I'll explain?"

"Nah," he said, but she was already clearing a space on his sofa. "Fuckin' hell, what d'you want from me now?"

"Simple honesty, Mike," she said, settling herself in. "Someone has been killing my Marksmen recently."

"It weren't me. I ain't a fuckin' idiot."

"Let me finish," she said coldly. "Someone has been killing my Marksmen, or rather, they were a few weeks ago. Their deaths were related to some others, including that of my godson a while before. You recall?"

He nodded. He'd heard about it.

"Well, as you can imagine, the fact my men keep dying has attracted my Uncle's attention. He's… displeased."

"How is old Charlie?" He asked, growing braver. "Still a cunt?"

"Yes," she said mildly. "But also still my boss. You haven't changed a bit."

"Neither 'ave you, love. Where's yer lapdog?"

"Who do you mean?"

"The brown-nosed brown, whatisname… Sharif?"

"Sharif is one of my dead."

A moment passed in silence.

"Tragic," Mike said.

She sighed, saying, "If I'm forced to kill you before this little visit is even over I'll be very unhappy. I'll be forced _also_ to skin that whore in your room alive to make myself feel better."

He said nothing, just looked at her blandly. Her words had stung him. _Not Gemma_…

"Mike, as I said, I want honesty. I've done some digging and realised the person who killed my godson and Richard is likely the same person who killed Sharif and his chauffer, and got our wizard ambassador arrested."

"What the fuck is this to do wiv me? I don' even own no weapons no more."

"No, but you know plenty of people who do. Mike," she said, forestalling his protest. "I'm not accusing you of murder. Ok? I'm simply asking for some enlightenment."

"What d'you fink I know? I'm not in that crowd no more-"

"Be quiet. The person who killed them was a wizard. I didn't realise it when I met him, I don't know how to recognise you lot. He did, however, have some distinctive markings. I did some digging and found some connections."

"Really?" Mike asked doubtfully.

"He was the star pupil of an old Martial Arts instructor- I'm sure you remember Mito Nobunaga? One of our most valued _ever _associates? Of course you do. You and he went far back. This is why I've come to you, Mike- because you end up knowing things, even if you shouldn't."

"I don't know who you're talkin' about," Mike said, but his voice was quiet and his stomach had suddenly become very heavy.

"His records in _your_ world say something very different about him, so at least I know his real name now and most likely his location, but he introduced himself to me as Shujin."

He tried to protest his innocence… say he didn't know anything… his tongue wouldn't work… he didn't breathe… he felt like he'd been stabbed…

"And," she was saying, "That's what he wrote his name as when he booked one of your specialist tattoos… Mike? Why don't you sit down, Mike, and get comfortable. You look a little pale…"

* * *

Ron wasn't in the best of moods. 

He'd just had potions and the old greasy bastard had taken five points off him alone for failing to complete the potion correctly- even Harry, waltzing in silently all ogf a sudden, hadn't gained anything off Snape but a strange look. Herbology had been boring and History of Magic he'd been too asleep to remember. It had been a slow day so far- lunch was a small respite.

He stared grumpily at Hermione, who was sitting on her own reading, and fought down a stab of jealousy.

_Stupid bossy know-it-all_, he thought savagely. _Gets every damn thing right. Why not leave some answers for the rest of the house to get?_

He stared hard at her but she was too absorbed in her reading to notice him. He shovelled another spoonful of mashed potato into his mouth, his eyes wandering the rest of the table.

He saw Harry sitting there, with barely anything on his plate and no drink- as he always had done- and realised the only high point of his day had been Harry walking into Potions. That shouldn't have been a high point- he couldn't think why it had been, because Harry hadn't said a hello to any of them, he'd just sat down in his dirty robes and got on with it like he had before, on his own.

Ron wondered if it was all true, all the rumours about him and Snape duelling, or whether that third year Ravenclaw he'd beaten up had come back for revenge, and whether they'd done it in a _girls_ toilet, or whether Harry had really been pushed out of the window and disappeared into the lake- his brother wasn't telling him anything and he'd _been there_.

He looked curiously and slightly enviously at Harry Potter, minding his own business and obviously deep in thought, and realised what it was about him.

Harry Potter was simply _fascinating_. He was mysterious, a Hero (though the way he'd spoken to Ron he obviously didn't seem to think so), only eleven which was the same age as Ron, had those scars on him and the famous one on his head, that weird silver earring, and yet he still acted like he was a normal guy.

Ron grinned. Harry then looked up, at him.

Ron blushed slightly, caught out, and couldn't think whether to look away or not.

Harry raised a fist- Ron thought he was going to get threatened- and made an 'Ok?' sign with his forefinger and thumb. Ron grinned again and nodded- then gasped slightly as a piece of mashed potato flew where Harry's head had been a mere moment before.

He dropped his cutlery, watching in surprise as Harry turned on his bench to see who had thrown it and saw Malfoy and his crew laughing, despite the fact the potato had missed.

"Feeling better, Potty?" Malfoy's voice drawled over the room, drawing a few stares.

"Do you have a death wish?" Harry whispered, his low voice carrying, drawing even more looks.

Malfoy laughed again, jeering, "Watch out, half-blood, or I'll get Professor Snape on you!"

Harry cocked his head, and Ron wondered what he was thinking behind those blank eyes. Before he could decide, Harry stood and began to walk out.

He jumped to his feet, stuffing one last mouthful in, and followed, not realising he was still holding his spoon.

Malfoy's voice called out again, saying, "Watch out for the windows!" and Ron wondered why he didn't turn around. Surely he'd heard it?

"Harry?" He asked, getting closer to his housemate in the Entrance Hall.

"Yes, Ron," he said, turning around.

"Are you ok? I asked earlier but you didn't…" _Listen?_ "…uh, you didn't hear."

"Yes, I'm fine, Ron," he said. Suddenly he went, "It was Snape, right?"

"What?"

"That cursed me?"

"I was going to ask _you_," Ron admitted. "It's just rumours."

"Damn," Harry said, looking up at the ceiling.

It was very disconcerting when Harry Potter looked at you- when he gave you his full attention you felt like very shallow water next to his bottomless pool. But somehow, Ron thought vaguely, it was even worse when his attention was on something else. With him staring at the ceiling, eyes moving, Ron felt like he wasn't even there.

Harry said, "Damn," once more.

Ron didn't know what to say. He realised how it must look- him standing in front of Harry, who was about his own height but seemed much taller, simply in silence, holding a spoon with potato on it.

"So… so were you asleep?"

There- he had Harry's attention. His eyes bore into Ron's. _That's what you wanted, isn't it?_ He taunted himself.

"What?"

"When – cos you missed like nearly a week of school. And people couldn't go in the hospital wing unless they were nearly dying. Fred and George tried to get in – I mean, they wanted to, but they couldn't," he babbled.

"I met them," Harry said vaguely. "On my first day."

"Oh, they didn't try to prank you did they?" Ron asked, actually worried for his brothers' safety.

"No," the boy said. He sighed. Ron fought for something interesting to say.

"But you're back in lessons now, right? Like, for charms next and… astronomy later?"

Harry nodded. "For the moment," he said.

"And – for the first flying lesson tomorrow?"

"What?" Harry asked, suddenly piercingly interested.

"The first flying lesson – its tomorrow afternoon," Ron plunged on, glad to have enraptured him.

Harry said very slowly, "Flying… on brooms…"

"Yeah. Have you never flown before?" Ron's voice rose in surprise, then he felt foolish.

"Never had much chance, Ron," Harry said.

"Of course, it's just – well, you'll love it. It's great fun."

"Ok. It's compulsory then?"

Ron gaped.

"You don't want to do it?"

Harry frowned. Then, suddenly, he gasped loudly. Ron stepped back.

"What's wrong?" He asked.

Harry's hand went to his head and he bent forwards slightly.

"Harry?" he said weakly. "Are you – is it your head? Your scar or something?"

Harry breathed deeply. He mumbled something.

"Shit," Harry said loudly and Ron fought not to grin at his language. "_Shi – it_. No," he said, talking to Ron suddenly. "No it's not my fucking scar. It's… _bollocks_."

"What's the matter? Is it from – from what happened?"

Harry said nothing, eyes unfocused, and then suddenly they snapped back again. He said nothing, staring over Ron's shoulder.

Ron looked behind him- to see Malfoy and his cronies there.

"What's this? A little lovers' triste?" Malfoy laughed and his friends followed suit.

Harry said nothing, and in a move Ron would later reminisce about with sheer pride, Harry grabbed the potato-covered spoon still in Ron's hand, bent it in his hands and threw it with a snap and a rustle of cloak.

Ron turned in time to see it hit the stunned blonde's forehead.

There was a second of silent disbelief… then Malfoy, a smear of potato over his forehead, dropped like a stone.

Harry turned and walked up the stairs, heading towards the second floor. Ron looked at him, then Malfoy, then Malfoy's confused and flustering friends, and then at Harry's retreating back.

He burst out laughing.


	16. The Second Flight

_Again I have comissioned a friend's computer, so I'm afraid I'm rushing and there's a chance this might not be edited very well. I apologise for it._

_Thank you all very much for your reviews- to critics of the new style, yes, I do understand. If the fiction is not to your taste that is your personal preference- you have the freedom read whatever you like, just as I do to write whatever I like. I appreciate the idea of opinion very much so- it's not to your taste, but if it catered to everyone's taste I'd be the best writer on the site and I in no way claim to be. The only thing I will say is this- to 'x', I live in London. I ask people, especially those not from the UK, to not lecture me on the language used in my home town in the period I was growing up in it- I've lived in a lot of different countries but I've always come back, and London is where I am now. I'm sorry if whatever rude word you encountered seems to be unrealistic to your preconceptions of the British, but I'm not going to change this to make it easier on the eyes of my foreign critics- there is nothing (language-wise) in this fiction that relates to England that I have not come across. I'd never write a novel about somewhere until I'd been there for a long time and was familiar with it, especially dialogue._

_Anyway, what was I saying? About writing styles, I warned people in the first part of the story it would change, and it will change again and then once more for the final book. It's slowed up here but it will accelerate gradually throughout the rest of the story. I've been able to get a lot of writing done so I'll be posting up chapters whenever I can reach a terminal._

_As I have said before, this is not the sort of fiction I usually write. It was an experiment for myself and, all told, I have not been best pleased with how it has come out. However, I shall continue in every way I can- RL setbacks have bollocked up my routine, but there is very little I can do._

_Thanks again to all reviewers for insight provided- all I can say about Ali is that you're welcome to keep guessing_ :-) _I apologise profusely if anyone feels I've kept you waiting._

_Peace. G.L._

* * *

Sipping her wine in front of the huge fireplace, the colour and taste as rich as the velvet she wore, commencing her evening routine, the woman found herself thinking. 

Narcissa tried not to think too much. She found that when she thought about things very deeply that she got herself upset. If she thought about Draco she upset herself. If she thought about her husband she upset herself and then him. If she thought about pretty much anything in too much detail, she'd sometimes even cry. Of course she'd do it briefly, silently and privately, but she'd cry nonetheless.

To distract herself from thoughts she'd usually occupy her time doing something mundane and pointless around the house. She'd water the greenhouse plants, despite the slaves keeping them in good order, or try on dresses she'd already worn that she was beginning to lose the fill of. Sometimes she'd sit and read for hours on end. Sometimes she played music, though not very often.

Rarely, but on a night such as this, she'd go to the cellar all on her own and choose a vintage bottle of something red. She'd go to the smaller of the two drawing rooms and refill her glass until her head felt warm. She'd listen to the enchanted piano in the corner and stare at the fire.

She wasn't really in the mood to do anything but think, and mourned her lack of self-control.

Draco was at school. It was his first year and she felt terribly lonely, even though she rarely welcomed his company in the manor- in fact, the only consistent time she spent with her son was at dinner. They'd dress up and sit and eat and wouldn't talk very much.

Occasionally Lucius would join them, but on some nights- such as this one- he'd lock himself in the library or the Master Study and do whatever it was he liked to do. Then she'd go upstairs and get into her Queen-sized bed in the master bedroom and lay awake until she heard him come to the room- he hardly ever got into her bed, but got into his own King-sized bed a few feet away- then listen to his breathing until she drifted off.

So she'd eaten on her own, enchanted a dessert tray to be especially heavy so that the house-elf dropped it and watched as it punished itself. Then she'd gone to the cellar.

_Is this being a family?_ She thought slowly, reluctant to question her idyllic existence. _Is this what a husband and a wife are supposed to be like? Alone?_

She thought of her own parents, grateful her situation wasn't worse. Her mother and father hadn't gotten along very well, and in 1965 when she was ten years old her mother Druella had gone to St. Mungo's because she'd had a nasty _fall down the stairs_, and she hadn't woken up. Narcissa stopped herself from thinking about the funeral.

_What can I do?_ She wondered innocently, trying to direct her thoughts to a simple activity to kill the evening away but inevitably thinking of a far greater version of the question. _Where could I go?_

Frustrated, worn out and quite drunk, it was just past 11pm when she walked valiantly up the stairs and to the door of the library- listening, there was no sound. She walked further along to the big study and listened again, swaying slightly, and she could hear her husband's low voice and found herself grimacing. Someone was answering him- _must be a fire-call,_ she thought sensibly. She vaguely recognised the responding voice but couldn't name it- the amount of formal events she'd been to and important people she'd met had blended most voices, faces and names into a jumble, ruining the good memory she'd so prized in her youth.

She found the grand staircase again and eventually got to her bedroom, passing quickly through and into her private wardrobe. From it she retrieved her toy- a six-foot Hispanic youth- and took him to bed without a word.

Forty minutes later, when she lay there alone, she was trying to achieve unconsciousness without the presence of her husband, but as she put her hands under the goose-feather pillow she felt something hard that was obviously out-of-place.

More sober now, though still more indignant than she'd usually be, she opened her mouth to bellow for a house-elf before realising it wasn't something they should have moved… it was a letter.

She took it out, her eyes focusing slowly in the dim light on the _Narcissa Malfoy_ on the front.

She frowned. _Lucius gets the letters, doesn't he?_

She opened it briskly and, on impulse, put the envelope back under the pillow, filled with secret and bizarre joy that she'd got her own mystery letter and not wanting anyone to know.

Unfolding it, Narcissa Malfoy read the name at the end before anything else. She then, without reading the contents, folded it straight back up again, her hands dead still although she knew they should be shaking.

She felt, suddenly, cold and empty and sober. She pushed the letter under the pillow and lay on the other side of the bed.

She didn't sleep that night- it seemed like dawn came with just the blink of an eye.

* * *

The rest of Wednesday and then Thursday morning Harry couldn't get what Mar had told him out of his head. He'd fetched his trunk, hidden it and organised his affairs (though he still didn't know about the missing dagger) and done his work like a good little student. 

Even walking alone to the flying lesson, as he was now, he couldn't believe what Mike had sent him.

'_Harry,'_ the message had gone, right as he stood in the entrance hall, his mind on Snape. _'Rebecca Hume and the Marksmen are looking for you. They think you killed Sharif. She came to my flat and she's not very happy with you at all. She also knows you're Shujin. It might not be safe to come back to London.'_

He'd sent back, _'Are you hurt? Why did she come to you?'_, with Mar saying it out loud on the other end.

'_You signed your name in the book as Shujin.'_

'_That's not the only reason is it?'_

'_No. There are things you don't know about Mito.'_

'_I'll find a more convenient way to talk to you. Are you hurt?'_

'_That doesn't matter.'_

'_Yes,'_ Harry had sent, furious. _'It fucking does. Answer.'_

'_I'm – I'll survive. Me and Rebecca go way back.'_

He'd, at that point, reached the library.

'_Right,' _he'd sent to Mar, knowing the bird was relaying it. _'I'll see you soon.'_

He needed to go to London. The only problem was that he had no idea how to get there- he'd never travelled outside of London or Kent, so was a bit stuck on how exactly, unless by train, he'd reach it. However, _Hogwarts: A History_ had told him that the train only ran at the beginning and end of scheduled annual holidays.

That was why he had decided to go along to flying lessons.

_I'm a fucking madman,_ he thought, looking at the class milling around and the brooms lined up along the grass.

Then Madam Hooch had come out, they'd 'upped' their brooms, Neville had fucked up the takeoff and the day had really kicked off.

* * *

Harry stared up, where Draco Malfoy sat smugly on his little broom, holding Neville's Remembrall, thinking. 

_I've got nothing against Neville,_ he thought. _I've got something severely against that blonde prick though._

He considered. Ron was trying to live up to his Gryffindor bravery, others in his house were fretting, some of the Slytherins were laughing sycophantically. The Ravenclaws seemed mildly interested, the Huffelpuffs worried. How _fitting,_ he thought savagely. He saw, then, the small Chinese girl whose name he didn't know staring at him- she was a Ravenclaw, and he remembered her suddenly from when she'd been staring at him on the lake, when he'd flown Neville's toad back to the boy's lap.

As soon as their eyes met she looked away, as though Harry wouldn't have noticed. He laughed slightly- humourlessly. _What the fuck does she want?_ He wondered. _Thinks I'm Neville's little protecting hero? Fuck that._

He turned his back on the scene and walked two paces towards the castle, then stopped.

He sighed, eyes closed.

"Shit," he muttered. He shook his head, saying, "Suppose I have to start somewhere."

As he looked back at Malfoy, flying in circles, he decided what a wonderful opportunity this would be to murder the little bugger were it not for the masses of spectators. He also realised that if he murdered a pupil Snape so obviously favoured, the Professor might attack him, giving him ample opportunity to kill the man in 'self-defence'.

_Work with it, Shujin,_ he told himself, looking around. _Circumstance and Chance- that's what it boils down to._

He held the broom in front of him, apart from the noisy crowd, and put himself on it the only way that felt natural. He didn't care about stance or posture or whatever it was called, as long as the damned thing flew.

He put his weight on it, thrilled yet unnerved at how it didn't sink at all, merely stayed in mid-air supporting his weight. He looked up at Malfoy.

_Can't be that hard._

The next thing he realised was that he was rocketing towards Malfoy like a bat out of hell.

The snotty little brat, to his credit, had seen it coming and recovered from his shock in sufficient time to roll out of Harry's grasp and shoot off towards the woodland.

_Shit,_ Harry thought, trying to turn. He saw where Malfoy had gone to and bolted straight after him, his opinion changed to _Perfect._

He reckoned it was a little more than a mile from where they'd been to the forest, but they were covering it at a rate of knots, ground whipping by under him and Malfoy growing larger in his vision.

Malfoy realised, just as they got over the woodland, that he'd just flown himself into a corner.

There was a moment of hesitation as he stopped, allowing Harry to gain ground especially quickly.

Malfoy considered. Malfoy reared back his arm. Malfoy threw the little glass ball.

Harry thought he'd thrown it _at _him but then realised Draco Malfoy actually expected him to go after it…

_Closer… closer…_

Harry grinned.

_Closer… there!_

Although it felt like more it was only about thirty miles an hour, the collision, he reflected as he felt his shoulder pop and his head jolted as though from electricity. Unfortunately, Harry had not, in his enthusiasm, considered recovering from his shoulder barge.

Their breath left them, their brooms span away, then treetops bristled and dug into his back as he rushed past them… together, they tumbled head-first into the forest, the sky spiralling out of view.

_Not again…_

He opened his eyes and saw branches. Leaves were still falling slowly around him.

_So I only just landed,_ he thought. He sat up slowly, checking himself for injuries with his arms, and finding none.

_Healed myself. Thank God for that. Now where did Draco get to?_

He looked around him, deciding to locate the broom first, but having no luck finding either the branch of wood or the boy. He wandered around, sure that Draco couldn't have gone very far, but to no avail.

A little while passed, Harry sitting on a rock, confused and frustrated.

Then he heard a groan.

He ducked under a huge dead tree and found Draco Malfoy on his hands and knees in a ditch.

The boy, gasping for air, noticed Harry and spat, "Good – flying – _Potter_…"

Harry shook his head, mouth open, looking at the gap under the fallen log.

"How the fuck are you still alive?"

Draco just coughed, not paying attention. Harry narrowed his eyes.

"Well, we'll soon fix that problem. Hold still," he said as he moved closer, his hands rising.

"_Potter!? – Malfoy!? Hello?"_

Harry looked up blithely, seeing the shape of his flying teacher buzzing around the treetops at various intervals, calling their names sporadically.

He looked at Draco.

He looked up.

Looking back at Draco, he bent down into the muddy crevasse and put his arms around the boy's neck, putting him in a secure headlock from behind.

His squeaks were muffled, but as Harry applied pressure, he heard a very clear female voice from above say _Point Me Draco Malfoy!_ He recognised the incantation with a jolt.

"Shit," he said to himself incredulously, not willing to believe such a perfect opportunity had been entirely wasted but still squeezing all the same. "I can't believe you're still alive. I'm losing my touch."

He was considering quickly looking for a rock to do it quickly when he heard a rustle and whoosh of wind behind him and realised his teacher must have landed- his forearm still around the struggling Draco's neck he suddenly had to cover it.

He yanked backwards, holding the blonde boy's rearing shoulders, shouting, "Hold _still_ you idiot, I'm trying to get you out! Help me– _push with your legs…_"

On cue, Harry pulled Draco bodily from under the log and they landed in a heap next to it.

"_Boys_! How _dare_ you both – you both of you _fly_ without supervision! Just fly off into the forest! _What were you thinking?_" She screeched, obviously extremely worried for not just their safety but for her own job. "The class said you collided! A mid-air collision could have _killed you!_"

_If only I was so lucky,_ Harry thought mildly, untangling himself placidly and thinking quickly.

"He – _get off,_ Potter – he flew into me! He barged me and knocked me – knocked me off… he _tried to kill me_!"

"Shut _up_, Malfoy!" Hooch bellowed.

On his feet, Harry turned to her very calmly, held up his palms and said, "Sorry about that Madam Hooch. I saw Draco fly off with something in his hands, and I know it says in various flying manuals that you should never carry objects on a broom unless in-game in Quidditch. I was worried for his safety."

"My _safety?_" the boy screeched.

Madam Hooch glanced at Harry, then turned to the other boy, glaring, and said, "Malfoy, the class said something like that. What were you carrying?"

"I believe it was something Neville dropped when he had his accident…" Harry put in casually, grinning at the unfolding situation.

"Who cares about the fucking Remembrall? Potter _attacked_ me!"

"What in the name of Merlin possessed you to – you _idiot,_ Malfoy, you're supposed to be an experienced flyer!" she screamed, indignant now as well as angry.

"It was a good thing I followed him, honestly, Madam," Harry said earnestly. "I saw him lose his grip and fall, and I followed him down- you just saw me find him and get him out. If I hadn't he'd be stuck there."

"YOU FUCKING LIAR!"

"_Silencio_," she said, pointing her wand at Malfoy. Harry was delighted and fought not to show it. "That isn't necessarily true – we'd have found him. Still, well - well done for helping him out, Potter, I suppose. He shouldn't have been carrying anything, least of all something that didn't belong to him, so it was his own stupid fault. Why did the class say you collided?"

Malfoy was squirming on the ground, ginger on his injuries, trying to shout but unable to make a note.

"Probably because as he rolled off his broom I flew straight after him and tried to catch his hand. I missed it – I had to evade all the branches and everything. But look at me and look at him- that's what it looks like when you fall. I'm not even scratched."

"I can _see_ that, Potter," she said, inspecting him out of the corner of her eye. "Where's the broom?"

"I don't know where his is, it might be lost I'm afraid," Harry said.

_Fuck, _he thought.

"Not _his_," she said, bending over Malfoy and checking his injuries.

"Oh, right- through here. One sec," he said, walking a few seconds deeper into the forest.

Focusing, he held his hand out in front of him, irritation, fear of failing at this incredible cover and fury at Malfoy still being alive channelling through him, and then he suddenly was swimming in a complete lack of emotion. He relaxed so completely he didn't feel the broom handle touch his hand, despite knowing it had.

He re-entered the little glade where Malfoy and Hooch were with the school issue broom in his arm about a minute later.

"I had a look for Malfoy's but I couldn't see it."

"Not to worry, you've got that one. Thank Merlin for that. Here – help me with him – right, now are you up to flying back Potter?"

He looked at the piece of wood in his hand, some of the twigs on it bent, that had this morning seemed so daunting and unworldly, but now seemed as mundane as concrete.

"Yes ma'am."

"Get on slowly then, take your time. Don't you fall off, now."

She cradled Malfoy, who looked like an infant, and settled herself into position on the broom.

_How can I use this to my advantage? _He considered as they lifted back, preparing to fly off at pace before realising that Madam Hooch, her broom weighed down by the weight of two people, was not planning on going anywhere fast.

He resigned himself to a slow, uncomfortable ride back.

"This is the worst first lesson we've had in 8 years," Hooch called over. "Two severe injuries, two brooms completely lost- I'll be surprised if they let me teach it at all next year."

"It wasn't your fault."

"You're _right_, Potter," she barked. "It was entirely the class' fault. But who was supposed to be responsible for them?"

Harry grinned. For some reason, he liked the straightforwardness of this teacher. She seemed very simple, no-nonsense and patient.

When they finally reached the castle, the class milling around where they landed, all of the students assembled seemed extremely surprised to see Harry Potter help a now-unconscious Draco Malfoy onto the ground so that Hooch could get off her broom.

"What happened?" Ron demanded, and Seamus echoed him. Hermione looked like she was fighting herself, because she obviously wanted to know what happened too.

"Nothing," he said, looking at Hooch start to levitate Malfoy. ""Idiot had Neville's ball thing, he couldn't fly with one hand and he fell into the woods. I tried to catch him."

"Wait, you tried to _catch_ Malfoy?" a Slytherin girl asked loudly.

"Yeah, I missed," Harry said, and then continued loudly to piss off Malfoy and his housemates, "Saved his life in the wood though. He was stuck under a branch and I got him out."

The Slytherins looked absolutely disgusted; Harry hoped the expression was for Malfoy. The Gryffindors didn't look much better, incredulous that Harry would actually try to help a Slytherin in trouble.

Harry grinned on the inside. _Let them form their opinions of me,_ he thought. _If they imagine me to be merciful and having no enemies, it will certainly help me out in the long run._

Before she went indoors, Hooch turned around on the steps, Malfoy suspended in front of her.

"For Malfoy's little stunt," she said, "Ten points from Slytherin, and another ten points for his housemates failing to stop him!"

The Slytherins groaned. _Perfect,_ thought Harry. _Let's make young master Malfoy into something of an outcast…_

"Potter, you are equally foolish for chasing after him, but for helping a schoolmate in trouble you can have ten points. Now get inside, all of you, and put those brooms away!"

* * *

Neville was back with them by dinner. Harry didn't say anything to him but he heard from his housemates that they'd told him about Harry and Malfoy's little debacle. 

The day ended, Harry had a nightmare about that dark figure who'd chased him down Knockturn Alley, who he hadn't realised he'd remembered, but for some reason instead of it being in Knockturn Alley it was in the glade in the forest where Malfoy had nearly met with a severe accident.

Somehow, from then, nothing of notice happened for days and days and weeks, or so it seemed. Harry settled, kicking and screaming, into the tedious routine that was school-life. He'd get up, eat a small amount, go to lessons, eat a small amount, go to lessons, eat a small amount, do work in the common room or research in the library, practise his raven-rune skills (he could nearly see shapes in the shadows when he tried to look through Mar's eyes) he'd talk to Mar, or Mike through Mar, or a housemate, he'd do more research, then he'd go to sleep and wake up in the morning and do the same thing again.

On weekends he'd get up later, go outside at about noon for exercise (later than Ali liked to do it, though he'd never admit it), run around the lake, sometimes go for a swim, etc. He'd take his library books outside sometimes. The weather was getting steadily colder but Harry believed this made you healthier- it was something his Sensei had said.

'Anyone can live in comfortable conditions, Shujin, but if you become to used to them then when conditions are poor you'll not survive.'

Simple, yet somehow very abstract. His sensei had once made Harry stand with him in a cold room, then follow him outside into the freezing rain and then finally go back into the room to appreciate how it seemed warmer.

They'd trained in the rain on the rooftops.

Reminiscing over those days, lying on a grassy hill by the lake in a torrential downpour on the first morning of October, remembering about when life had been simple survival, he decided to talk to Mike.

'_Mar,'_ he sent his Raven.

'_Yes?'_

'_Is Mike there?'_

'_He's asleep.'_

Harry laughed- it was nearly 2pm.

'_When he's awake,'_ he said, '_Please tell him that I want to have a serious talk about Mito with him.'_

'_Is that all?'_

'_Yes. How are you?'_

'_Horrible. I want rodents- clean, wild rodents, not the little diseased bastards that plague the sewers here.'_

'_You can come back soon, if you want. You'll have to live in the forest though.'_

'_That sounds better. How long before I can?'_

Harry considered.

'_Probably about a week or so, once me and Mike have sorted out a way we can communicate.'_

'_You mean communicate without me?'_

'_Yeah, then you can come back up here.'_

'_Ok.'_

Harry opened his eyes again, looking at the rain clouds, wondering whether to risk retrieving a book from his trunk and reading it. Considering the whether, he decided to go inside.

Walking through the open front doors, he thought the entrance hall was empty, so as soon as he passed over the threshold he used his Art to make himself completely bone dry in the blink of an eye.

He headed towards the stairs before realising there were eyes on him.

Hand on his wand, he turned slowly, expecting it to be Ali, despite the fact he'd barely seen him in the past few weeks.

It was the small Chinese girl, the Ravenclaw that he'd seen staring at him before.

He blew air out from between his teeth.

"Who the hell _are_ you? What do you want?"

She jumped and started off towards the great hall, but he was across the hall in a few paces and stopped her with an arm on her shoulder.

"Tell me who you are!" He hissed at her. "Why are you always staring at me?"

"Because – Let go!" she said, with force behind her words that belied her size, and he did. She straightened her robes. "Because you do things without your wand, like me."

"My Art?"

"Call it what you want. Not many can do it- mostly it is an oriental talent. Westerners like to use their wands, lacking our concentration."

"Right," Harry said. "Well, I was taught for a bit by a Japanese man, but although he improved my concentration I've always been able to do little things."

"You do not concentrate fully. You let your mind fall into yourself and your body push the power out. You use too much power."

She sounded as if he'd really personally offended her. He was just surprised- he didn't know any other wizards had that skill.

"Do you know how to concentrate more?"

She smiled a very small, dainty smile up at him, creasing her eyes, and said in a sweet voice, "I could unstitch every seam in your skin from here if you were in Hong Kong."

His face remained blank, but inside he recoiled- he'd heard worse threats made every day for three years, but none so eerie and never from a character so quiet and shy.

"So," he said slowly, "Would you consider teaching me?"

"We can't at school."

"I'd keep it a secret."

"No," she sighed exasperatedly, another completely unexpected, over-characterised gesture that made him frown. "The powers never work so well at Hogwarts. It's something about the place."

Harry's eyes snapped up suddenly, fixing on thin air straight ahead.

"Maybe it's something in the water," he muttered, imagining things coming together in his head. _That's why I can't use my wand properly- I didn't take the magic dampening potion… That's what was in the drinks._

He was distracted from this sudden train of thought, however, by the girl saying that it wasn't anything in the water.

"What was that?"

"It's nothing in any water. It's ambient magic. Potions can only suppress a small amount of natural power."

_Why does my wandless magic work then?_ He wondered. _This gets more and more confusing. If that wasn't the potion, what the hell was?_

"Anyway," she suddenly said very loudly, making him jump again at the randomness of her actions. "Nice to meet you, Harry, remember I'm Su Li. Ravenclaw. I'll get back to you on that homework."

She then walked straight into the Great Hall.

_What the fuck was that?_ Harry thought, standing there on his own. Then he realised.

He looked around slowly, seeing nothing unusual, then fell delicately back into his centre, so subtle in it that it was like a feather landing on a cushion. He listened very carefully to everything around him and picked up on the heartbeat about ten feet behind him.

He stood, listening, for a few seconds, hearing the beats and the very faint breathing, but couldn't discern who it was.

_Should I say something? _He wondered, coming out of his trance and back into the supposedly empty hall, the muddy rainwater on the floor reflecting the fire of the chandelier and the noises of late-eaters floating in from the great hall. _Should I go?_

He ended up deciding that, seeing as whoever this was didn't make a single move in all the time he was standing there, and obviously didn't seem to be a threat, he'd say nothing.

He walked up the stairs and the invisible stranger didn't follow.

* * *

Under his robe he took his trunk to the roof as soon as it got dark enough. He practised sword forms and smoked and read until dawn, uneasy without knowing why. 

Snape smirked from under the cloak.

He walked into the dungeon corridor, then whipped it off and stuffed it into a pouch in his robes, about turning and walking into the entrance hall again.

_So, Potter's got himself a little lady-friend. And wandless magic? Hmm… something about a potion… and what an infinitely curious remark about a Japanese man teaching him magic…_

He walked up to Dumbledore's office, organising his memories.

* * *

"Narcissa," he said. "Good evening." 

She looked up at him from her sewing.

"Good evening, husband. How are you?"

"Fine – couldn't you call servant to do that work?"

Lucius eyed the tapestry's beginnings with distaste.

Narcissa looked at the threads in her hands. Feeling rebellious, she didn't put them down to talk to her husband, but resumed anyway.

"It occupies my fingers, Lucius. What can I do for you? Would you like a glass?"

She indicated the Chateau on the table.

"No. Perhaps later. I have to – I have a piece of news."

She frowned up at him, asking, "What news? Good news?"

"I'm not sure. We…" he stopped, awkward. She stared at him. "My brother will be coming to live with us for a while."

"What do you mean?"

"He says that business has called him back to England."

"You brother is in a ministry holding cell, what are you – _oh_! Oh… Lucius, no!"

Her heart was beating extremely fast.

"Not my little brother, the whelp; my half-brother."

"You cannot be serious."

He gave her an eloquent look.

"Absolutely not. No. You can't – _Lucius!_ Why is he coming back!?"

"He wouldn't specify. I spoke to him a few days ago."

She remembered the fire call she'd heard faintly. She was shaking her head, sewing forgotten, mouth wide.

"No, Lucius! Please, please no…"

"He's coming to stay. There is no discussion," he said. "I was simply informing you."

"No!" her voice took on desperation and pleading. "He – not in our house, Lucius! _Not in my house!_ Not him… have you _forgotten_ what he did!?"

"Not in..? This is _my_ house, woman!" he bellowed at her, a strand of blonde hair falling out of place as he gestured. Narcissa sunk back into her seat. "Do you think I've forgotten? Do you _think _I want _him_ here? I don't have a choice!"

"No," she felt tears coming. "Please, no, husband – lover – not him, not here. He can stay in London! He can – we can pay for his accommodation, but _not in this house_!"

The slap was hard, making her vision go white for a second and ringing in her ears. She didn't cry out, she simply sat, stunned and numb, raising a hand to her smarting cheek.

Lucius checked his knuckles after the back-hand and gave a small _tsk_ of disapproval.

"I can't believe you made me do that, Narcissa. Calm yourself- stop acting like a _stupid fool._ Grow up. We'll host him as we don't have a choice- you will be the polite mistress you always are to my guests."

"He's – he's a _vampire,_ for pity's sake, Lucius!"

He stared at her coldly, glaring as though at an inferior, saying, "I know that. I don't like to call the _bastard_ a brother, but he is. He can't stay anywhere else because he's still _hiding_ from the authorities. You – this is the end to the discussion. I am not explaining myself. You've been informed. Good night."

He walked out calmly, as though they'd been discussing an everyday topic and he'd grown bored, spine straight and overly formal in his casual robes. Narcissa burst into tears- not for the slap, Merlin knew she'd suffered worse, but for the fact that Saevus Malfoy, fugitive of eighteen countries and active _vampire_, was going to be staying at her house. The same half-brother of Lucius' who'd not been in the last war simply for the fact he'd been imprisoned in Africa. The same half-brother who'd slaughtered four-hundred people, muggles and wizards, in a single bad mood.

The same half-brother who'd damn-near succeeded raping her on his last visit.

For no reason, Saevus Malfoy was going to be coming to live in Malfoy Manor once again… his foul, poisonous letter, full of loathing, horrifying threats and innuendo, had not been a lie.

She cried herself into a fitful sleep and awoke in the early hours, cold, shivering and checking her neck unconsciously for punctures.


	17. The Weak Foundations

_Unfortunately any hope of being able to post once a week has been ripped to pieces. I'm very sorry, I know what it feels like to have to wait for updates and I'll post when I can, but I can't promise that it will be a regular rate. Again, I apologise profusely. Thank you for the reviews- I came on dreading dozens of flames for not being on time and I was considering not posting at all if I'd lost all my readers, but seeing support on there was the boost I needed._

_Hopefully I'll see you again soon- relocating myself to Spain for a little while to clear shit up, internet cafes FTW until I can get myself a PC. at the moment all my stuff is on memory cards lol._

_As for the story- it's speeding up again a little now, I read it through for a final edit and recap before I wrote more, new characters still being introduced, laying the foundations for the climax of book two and the setting of the rest of the story. Things that need to happen are beginning to, even if it doesn't look like it, more questions are raised, more sets are introduced, and the plot is beginning to unravel very slightly. I'll post another one today if I have the time and money to edit it too. I hope you enjoy..._

_Take care and Peace, G.L._

* * *

"Excuse me?" The one called George said.

Harry sighed, trying to be civil, saying, "I need to talk business with you."

The twins looked at each other, grinning, and one said, "What sort of business?"

"Don't get us wrong," George said.

"We heard about your escapade with Filch, Harry, which was frankly…"

"Inspiring."

"Yeah," Fred agreed. "But we're not sure if you were under the misinterpretation of that being…"

"Deliberate," Harry said blankly.

"Which it wasn't," George said quickly. "It isn't like we can predict where our beloved caretaker will be every second of his life."

"Though," Fred said, "If the sort of business you want to discuss is to do with _allowing_ us to know where he'll be…"

"Shut up," Harry said. "Look, I don't give a shit about your practical joking nature bollocks, I need to know something."

"Quite the mouth," George said, frowning.

"Not calling on us to prank an enemy, then, Harry?"

"We'll do Malfoy for free."

"Goes without saying."

Harry shook his head, rapidly growing weary of the two.

"I," he began, "think we should go somewhere a bit more private to talk."

As they headed upstairs into the third year dorm, one of them was saying they'd happily take care of any pesky Ravenclaws for a small fee.

"Shut up and mind your business," Harry said sharply, not about to bring his relationship with Ali into the mix. "I need your professional advice."

"Who doesn't?" Fred said.

"Dumbledore took something from me. I won't go into detail but it's not strictly within the rules of the school to own one. I need to know where it is because I want it back."

"What makes you think we know?" George said mildly.

"Six knuts make me think you'll have a fair idea."

"Hmm," Fred considered. "A fair idea, perhaps…"

"I _think_ Ten would be able to make us tell you where exactly," George said mildly.

"I _think_ I don't react well," Harry said, "when people try to rob me."

Fred held up his hands, perching on a bed, saying, "Hey, you're the one who wanted to talk business."

"No information is worth more than six knuts. I've made enquiries- you're standard rate for that sort of thing is six," Harry said, leaning against the door.

"Yes, but you're a special case, aren't you Harry?" Fred said.

"In what way?"

They looked at each other and then at him.

_I can't believe I'm negotiating prices with a pair of clowns,_ he thought to himself.

"No hero discount?" he enquired mildly.

They both laughed loudly, and Harry waited.

"Well," Fred said. "We like you, Harry."

"You're funny," George continued, "and for a 'hero' you don't seem to mind too much about such trivial things as…"

"School rules," Fred.

"Caretakers," George.

"Authority," Fred.

"And so on," George concluded. "So we'll give you some pretty decent intelligence, if you'll tell us what it is exactly that you've lost and why you want it back, for…"

Fred considered, saying, "For _six_ knuts… do we have a deal?"

Harry shook his head.

"If I told you what it was, you may as well keep your information and simply get it back for me… what if, for six knuts, you don't tell me where the confiscated items are kept, and you fetched it for me, thereby holding onto your precious information and giving me the item back, benefiting everyone. What if I were to spread around the location upon learning it?"

The twins looked at each other for a time. They seemed to be thinking it through using both of their thoughts. Harry wasn't amused in the slightest, but considered the possibility of spells allowing you to hear someone else's thoughts… used in canon, or even on its own, such a spell could be extremely useful…

"Alright," George said, turning back.

"Four in advance, you tell us what it is you need reclaimed, we go get it tonight, we trade tomorrow morning- the item for three knuts. Deal?" Fred asked, smiling.

"That seems to total at seven knuts. If I'm paying an extra coin it'll be for the item's reclamation this evening."

"Done," George said with a grin. His twin echoed him.

Harry nodded, holding out both hands which both twins shook. He went to the door and checked there was nobody behind it, looked briskly under the beds and then went up close to Fred and George.

"I want confidentiality- if you get caught; you weren't doing anything for me."

"_Caught?_" Fred gasped.

"You wound us, Harry, we'll not be _caught!_"

"Yes, but _if_ you are I _won't_ expect a refund of my four knuts in exchange for you _not_ saying what you're looking for or who for. Ok?"

"Perish the thought," George said.

"I'll tell you what," Fred continued. "If we're caught, we'll keep on trying to get it, and we'll shave a coin off for every day we don't."

"Alright, here's the money," Harry said, pulling out four bronze coins from his pocket. He'd had six on him, just in case. "And this is what you're looking for; it's a small, ornate silver dagger. I'm certain it'll be the only one there. It's very beautiful but obviously very… dark, kind of. You'll notice it."

"A Dagger?" Fred whistled. "Not what I expected."

"Still, we'll do our part, Mr. Potter. Have a wonderful evening!"

They disappeared out of the room, and Harry followed afterwards, rubbing his eyes.

He really wanted his dagger back- he often felt a lot more secure with it on his person. The past few days he'd taken to either carrying his sword under his expanded cloak, or even his gun in its holster at the back of his belt. For some reason, as the days neared Halloween, he was feeling exceptionally uneasy.

He knew, however, that his 'business' with the Weasley twins was not the only example of its type that was beginning under his direction. When co-ordinating such things, one no-doubt felt anxious about failure.

_That reminds me- I must check in to see how Mike's coming along,_ he thought.

* * *

Mike Chow got off his bike, outside a branch of the nationwide bookseller that was quite near to Charing Cross. He frowned, as he always did, as he walked into this bookshop- it was large, well lit and heaving with people. 

He winced slightly as he brushed shoulders, uncomfortably aware of his recent injuries at the hands of Rebecca Hume in her interrogation of him. He felt humiliated, vengeful and infuriated, as he always felt when she walked away from him. Even with magic it had taken hours to clean the flat, and he was still looking for a new assistant. He shook his head, focusing on the present.

Unlike other retailers, book shops were more than used to strange-looking people wandering in and out, so nobody went out of their way to move around the short oriental with all the tattoos. He walked up two flights of stairs and moved to the 'Health,' section, picking a book off the shelf and pretending to read it.

People milled around him as time wore on- he was waiting for about ten minutes, having exchanged the book in his hand four times, when he heard a familiar voice.

He turned, watching through the crowd in this section as a small, stout bald man being asked for help by a middle-aged black woman turned towards her. Mike winced, predicting what would inevitably come.

The small man, with the shop's name printed on his T-Shirt and a name-badge saying 'Fuck You' pinned to it, was found upon closer inspection to have absolutely _no_ hair at all on his exposed skin. His eyes were bland and plain, his skin smooth, his teeth off-white and straight.

Chow hung back, amused at what he knew would unfold.

"Excuse me," she said to him. The bald man ignored her until he was asked again.

"Yes," he said with a slow smile.

She gestured towards the Mind, Body and Spirituality section and asked, "Can you tell me if you stock any Paulo Coelho?"

"The _Brazilian?_" he asked with a sneer. "I'd guess so, from that name-plate on the shelf behind you that says 'Paulo Coelho'."

"Oh," she said, looking. "Ah – do you know if you have 'The Alchemist' in stock?"

He stared at her, moving around her slowly and running his hand along the spines of books lazily, saying, "For your brother, right?"

"Sorry?" she said, confused.

"For your brother? In prison? Or maybe a close friend…"

Her mouth hung open slightly, unsure if she'd heard correctly.

"I mean," he said airily, some of his native South-African accent slipping through. "You're not buying it for yourself- judging from your hair and shoes, you're too poor to be unhappy. So you're buying it for someone else. But it isn't for a woman- black women don't buy self-help books for other black women. It's rude."

"Wha – what are you talking about?" she asked, taken so far aback she could barely speak.

"And," he continued, pulling a book from the shelf without looking at it, "a Black woman will rarely buy a book _anyway,_ on principle. So you're buying it for a close relative or friend, most likely your teenage brother, so that he can read it and forget himself and feel better about being behind bars."

Her eyes were open wide but she'd shut her mouth.

"In honesty," he said, leaning against the shelf. "In all honesty, if I were a good, decent, Christian human being- _as I am_- I wouldn't sell you this. Why? Because your brother deserves to be behind bars. He doesn't need a book to take his mind off whatever atrocity he committed to get put there- he needs a lot of time to sit alone with his head in his hands and consider what he's done, and how he's going to change. _This book_," he held it up, "Isn't going to do _shit all_ for him. He's a fucked up, bad individual and he needs to realise that himself."

"How _dare _you," she breathed, completely horrified.

"No- how dare _you_, bitch, walk into my store and think you know more than me. You love Irony, don't you? You just love it- a coloured woman walks into a shop in London and asks a white man for assistance. Sure, she can look on the shelf herself, and find the book she was standing three feet from in five seconds, but _no-_ she has to put the idle white man to work. As I said – the coloured woman is a huge fan of irony."

She didn't say anything. She didn't seem to know how to respond- he wasn't imposing or aggressive, he was being completely and utterly casual, a lazy, taunting smile contorting his features.

His eyes suddenly flicked up to see Mike standing there. He grinned sourly. He pushed the book into the woman's chest, her hands going automatically to it, saying, "Anyway, that's six pounds, thanks a lot and have a lovely day."

She shook her head slowly, staring at him.

"_Excuse_ me, ma'am. You have a blackhead on your neck, by the way," he said, pushing past her. "Chink?" he asked as he got closer.

"'Ello Taye," Mike greeted him neutrally.

"I haven't seen you since the year of the dog, Chinky! Shit, Chow, you look fuckin' terrible. Why are you here? Want me to find you a book?" He grinned savagely.

"No – I need ta talk some business wiv you."

"That supposed to threaten me?"

"Fuck off. I'm serious."

"Alright – go then. What do you need?"

"When's your break?" he asked, looking around him at the busy shop.

"Don't know," Taye said, leading them down the stairs. "They don't know I'm gone and if they do they don't give a shit. Where we headed?"

"Next door."

They found themselves in the coffee shop, Taye not drinking anything and Mike with a small hot chocolate.

"Right, you're wasting my day here Mikey. Talk."

"I need to hire you."

"I don't fuck the Chinese," Taye said instantly, cracking into peals of laughter. Mike, used to this from their time in the Marksmen together, waited for him to settle down. A couple at the next table moved away.

"Right," Mike said once Taye was back with him. "It's to do wiv _my_ side'a London."

He waited for a joke about Chinatown, but Taye nodded, saying, "Wizards. Wankers, the lot of 'em. Who do you want killed?"

Mike shook his head, sipping his drink. Taye was a squib from a colonial English/African family of wizards who'd been cast out when it was revealed he had not a drop of magic in his blood. He bore a grudge, to say the least- he had no love for Mike at all, not helped by the fact that he was Asian and Taye was a severe racist… but he did love money, and he knew Mike paid well.

"It's not a hit. I need somefin' stolen."

"From wizards..?"

"Nah- from Goblins; you're stealin' from wizards but its goblins guardin' it."

"You mean _Gringotts_, don't you? Fucking Gringotts. Should have known. You start to get my hopes up then it turns out you're being a laugh. Go back to Chinatown, brau."

"No, Taye – listen to me for a bit."

The South African, a very strange looking man when he was happy and somehow even eerier when he was being dead serious as he was now, raised his hairless eyebrows.

"You're doing a piss poor job of convincing me, Chow."

"It wouldn' be stealth- why do you fink I came to you? You could make noise from a… a sound-proof room. I want you in disguise, init."

Taye shook his head, searching for his cigarettes, saying, "Won't work mate. Even if I disguise myself enough to get close to a vault, I'll end up - up – _do_ you _fucking mind!?_" he suddenly screamed.

Mike jumped, to his shame, and span to look where Taye was staring. He was looking at a group of four or five cultured-looking teenagers who were just as startled as Mike was.

"What are you trying to pull? Eh?" Taye shouted at them, his voice carrying over the second floor of the coffee shop, eyes glaring. "Listen to some other fuck's conversation- get the fuck out of my sight."

They left instantly, one of them stumbling on his chair in his haste. Some others on the floor left too, until they were the only people in their corner, allowing them to talk unheard. Recognising this, Mike nodded, realising what Taye- although in his somewhat maniacal way- had achieved;

Privacy.

"What was I saying?" he asked as he lit up. "Oh yeah- even disguised enough to get to a vault, I won't be able to get in. I've never been in there but I'm not a fuckin' moron."

"What if you could get in?"

"Then – then – oh, for Christ's holy stake, you heathen cunt, don't keep me in suspense!"

"I'd give ya ways to get inta where I needed you. I'd need you to actually go and bring what I need out, disguised as 'oever you needed to be, which I'd give you details about."

"Let me get this straight," Taye said, grinning through his cloud of smoke. "You want me to march into the scum's bank as a wizard, despite not actually performin' any _magic_, and go to a vault and bring you what's inside?"

"Not one - three vaults."

Taye laughed for a solid minute. Mike finished his drink and looked around him at the place- it was nice in its way. Simple wood furnishings, brown leather seats. Taye was speaking.

"How am I gonna bring these items out?"

"We'll provide your means and transportation," Mike said, using his best official voice.

"Two questions," he said, suddenly feral. "One – who the fuck is this 'we' you're suddenly talkin' about?"

"Me and my associate," Mike said, enjoying himself. "Like a partner. You won' meet 'im but 'e'll be the one supplying everyfing we need."

Taye growled, his eyes glinting, saying, "I don't work for the fuckin' _Marksmen_ no more, Chow. If you're doin' this for them you can fuck right off."

Mike spat on the ground. He pulled out a small knife, his eyes not leaving Taye's, and cut his palm open as the hairless man sat back in surprise.

"I swear on my own blood," Mike said, not reacting to the pain of the cut, "that I will spill every last drop of it from my body before servin' those bastards again."

A pool formed on the table. Taye laughed again, croaking, "You dramatic bastard!"

"Do we have a deal, mate?" Mike asked.

"Nah – one more question sunshine; what do I get out of this?"

"Two hundred and fifty galleons."

"My, my, you're prepared. It's been a while- how much is that in real money?"

"In sterling tha's about twenty fousand quid."

Taye stared, saying, "You're havin' a laugh with me, Chow…"

"We want what we can get from those vaults. A Galleon is a solid gold coin- nearly 80 quid each. You'll get two hundred 'n' fifty of 'em to do what you want wiv, which we'll count out of it at the end."

"You crazy bastard," he said. "What if there ain't that many in there?"

"There's definitely enough in all three, and if there ain't my colleague 'as enough funds out of the bank to cover any missin'. So, Taye, 'cos I need to go… do we 'ave a deal?"

The South-African stared at him.

* * *

_This was so stupid, _Harry thought again and again. _What possessed me to try this?_

Even after his disastrous Raven ritual ending so messily, he'd still attempted this. He was exhilarated- the first one, the Panther, had gone perfectly. But no sooner had he swallowed down the blood-replenishing potions had he begun the second ritual, the Dragonfly, which was (according to the book) one of the most difficult to perform at the best of times.

Harry had become overconfident again.

This was one of the reasons he wanted the Dragonfly performed- since coming to Hogwarts, in the weeks he'd had that were entirely uneventful, he'd come to realise a difference in himself. Something was wrong with him- his attitude, demeanour and the way he handled things had completely changed recently… _I'm becoming a total pussy,_ he thought.

It was the surrounding environment, he was certain. He was unused to such a quaint, clean little world.

Because of this, he'd decided to begin toughening himself up again, in whatever way he could. _There's no necessity here, apart from Ali. I'm not under threat every single day, or if I am, I don't fucking feel like it._

He barely completed the Dragonfly, and when he did (though it took more than twice the time it should have) he collapsed, unconscious, immediately.

He'd done the Panther for obvious reasons- it supposedly enhanced speed, stealth, power and overall physical deadliness. He'd stolen the ground fang from the potions laboratory the day beforehand. The Dragonfly, however, was a last-minute decision that seemed like a good idea at the time- the wings had been harder to get, because Dragonflies weren't used in potions… physically, they had no magical value. But the rune? The rune apparently enhanced the abilities believed in and recorded in the East centuries ago, which included those of adaptation, illusion and general transcendence.

Harry wanted to adapt to this world, because he was finding it extremely difficult to be street-Shujin while being able to stick around at school long enough to get his money.

Although, in fairness, sticking around was a back-up plan… a likely contingency in case his and Mike's heist didn't quite work out how it should. The rate of success when it came to breaking into Gringotts wasn't high… about a billion-to-one… because Gringotts had never, ever been successfully robbed.

But it was worth a shot.

He'd broken into Hagrid's Hut, dropping some bacon hearts for Fang, while the giant was out doing whatever it was he did around the school. It had taken him seven minutes to locate a suitable net when, by a stroke of luck as he was leaving; he caught sight of a display on the wall near the door.

The delicate display case contained dead and dried butterflies, beetles, insects and, to his astonishment, Dragonflies.

Not daring to believe his luck he'd smashed and removed the glass of the wooden case, extracted one of the creatures he needed, replaced the net and the case where they'd been and swept the broken glass under the rug, walking out casually with it cradled in his hands. It was beautiful, even in death, but the surreal circumstances of finding it meant he couldn't dare for it to be true. It was too perfect.

Karma dictated that he'd fuck up the ritual somehow in penance.

When he awoke, inspecting the damage, he cleared himself up and rose to Sunday 27th October, climbing out of his case and thinking of things he needed to do, making a mental list.

He was beginning to concoct a plan involving Ali and Draco, two of the people he had decided to kill. He was wondering if he could get the two birds with a single stone, but every hypothetical situation he could imagine didn't quite add up. He was tempted to try and frame one for the murder of the other, but that would involve making the two of them enemies, something too complex and risky to be conceivable- also the entire school was more aware than he'd have liked that he had no love for either of them. As far as he knew, Draco didn't even know Ali, and Ali had nothing more than indifference to the blonde Slytherin.

He'd decided Ali was his priority. The black Ravenclaw had to die, in the interests of Harry's self-preservation. Something was wrong when it came to Ali- Harry had no idea what it was, and wasn't sure he was overly bothered in finding out, but someone who Harry should have had no trouble at all in destroying managed to get the better of him time and time again. It was more than circumstance.

He went to the library after eating some eggs, sneaking as he usually did into the restricted section the first chance he got, selecting some books and then finding an empty classroom to practise magic in. Though he wouldn't admit it for fear of jinxing it, his wandwork was improving slowly. In the right frame of mind he could cast a charm on something and have the desired effect, but he knew there was some sort of prevention when it came to his wand.

What Su Li, who he hadn't spoken to recently, had said to him played on his mind, as did the possibilities of _what_ potion it could be Dumbledore was giving the school.

_Questions, questions and more fucking questions,_ Harry thought, practising a permanent-sticking charm and gluing the entire classroom's contents, one by one, to the ceiling.

* * *

He stubbed out his third cigarette, waiting for Fred and George Weasley on the rooftop, beginning to get impatient. He'd been practising incantations, miming silent charms to himself, before he discerned from the moon that the twins were an hour late.

Eventually the door opened- Harry looked down from his vantage point a little way up the tiles, ready to flatten himself and remain unnoticed if it was anyone but the two. Fortunately it was the brother pranksters.

"Harry?" one whispered in the dark, the door closing behind them.

"Shite – he's gone."

Harry shook his head, identifying which was which.

"What's that smoky smell?" George asked his brother.

"You're late, boys," Harry said down to them. They started and looked up.

"Potter?"

He didn't justify their question with an answer.

"Is this how you usually do business?" was all he replied.

"Mate – Filch was trying to-"

"Do you have my dagger?" Harry interrupted coldly.

"Yeah," Fred said, holding out a shiny object. "It wasn't where we thought it was…"

Harry stood and walked down the sloping tiles. He took the dagger from them without looking at them, inspected it, and then tucked it into his inner-enlarged cloak with a sigh.

"Remind me, guys," he said quietly. "What was our agreement?"

"We know," George said, wincing in the moonlight.

"Here," Fred said, handing Harry two coins. "Two days late, so two knuts back as we promised."

"Harry," George began. "It wasn't – I mean, this doesn't normally happen."

"I don't want to hear excuses. I have it and the deal is done to the original terms. You can go now."

"Mate," Fred said pleadingly.

"Look – I don't care. Thanks for getting it, despite it being ridiculously late. I've got it now, that's all I wanted."

"Alright," George said, looking at his twin in the near-darkness.

Fred said nothing, and Harry turned away, walking up the tiles to the top again and lighting a cigarette as he sat down. Watching their eyes glint in the moonlight he knew what was going through their heads.

After a moment he said, "Going then? And no, guys, I won't hesitate to use my dagger if word of me smoking gets around."

"Are they muggle… er, whatever they're called?" Fred asked up quietly.

Harry didn't answer.

"Could we try one?"

Again, Harry maintained his silence, bored of them and their shit business.

"Harry?"

"No, you can't try a cigarette. Either you go or I do."

They left after a second, suitably shamed, and Harry reclined on the rooftop.

He smiled, thinking once again about spells that would allow you to hear what people were thinking.

* * *

Severus hated being in the staff room. It was one of his most despised frequents in the entire school. Everyone was so _friendly…_ so collectively _relieved _at being off duty. There was always some loud conversation going on- presently that excuse for a flying-teacher and the Head of Ravenclaw- and, on a chilly October morning, Snape wanted nothing more than to be in his reclusive sanctum in the dungeons.

He glowered at everyone nearby in his free hour, trying not to think about the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw lesson he was steadily approaching.

He flicked his eyes across the pages of _Balm, Balsam and Essence_, even though he'd read it a thousand times before, taking his mind as far away as he could.

_As though I didn't hate this place enough as a student,_ he thought sullenly. _I ended up teaching here. I could be researching in the Peruvian Mountains or brewing in the Calcutta International Apothecary, but no. I was roped into rubbing snotty noses into grade G potion texts._

He stood- Vector stared at him and he glared right back until she looked away. He moved towards the small, dingy kitchen-area, pouring a mug of water for himself, putting his book on the side.

Drinking it, staring into space, he imagined himself as the senior brewer of the country, concocting dazzling new potions hidden away from the public and gaining national recognition for it... Writing a book of his own…

He vaguely noticed Quirrel enter and thump something on the counter. He ignored the fool- a capable mind with the blood cut off by that turban. _What a damnable idiot_, he thought.

Still in his daydream, he put the mug in the sink (where it began to wash itself) and picked up the book, sitting back down in his chair with his eyes closed. He didn't dare look at the time.

Opening it at the dog-eared page, he began reading, and didn't notice for a full minute that there was something wrong.

…_and oft-debated subject, the topic of the stone brings heat to any discussion in a traditional household. Still barely a rumour, despite numerous 'eye-witnesses' claiming they'd seen it (and in some cases _used_ it), it is uncertain as to whether this mythical, incredible feat of alchemy has naught to do with the modern world or whether it remains firmly rooted in the realm of myth. However, no matter what the case is, there is no question that Nicholas Flamelle has something very special up his sleeve that has allowed him to reach the pinnacle of age he is currently perched upon, remaining the longest living Wizard since Merlin. The definitive ingredients of the stone are believed to be as follows; sulphur, owl talon, giant's blood, dragon's blood, liquid mercury…_

Snape blinked.

_This isn't my page,_ he thought. _This has nothing to do with Scent-Magic._

Frowning, he looked at the pages of the book for his marked page, but found this to be the only one. He turned the book around and read the spine.

It had written in silver-embossing on the creasy black leather, 'Legendary Alchemical Feats, as compiled and analysed by Professor. Jutta Sjem'

_This isn't my book. What's going on?_

He realised he'd picked up Quirrel's by mistake when the man himself suddenly stood in front of him, staring at him, all semblance of stuttering and uncertainty gone.

"I believe you have my book, Severus," he whispered quietly. Snape was suddenly unnerved for no reason… perhaps because of the fact that thirty seconds ago Quirrel had been his usual bumbling self.

Now he was completely different… as though someone else had stepped into his body…

"Where has mine gone?"

"It's on the counter where you left it," strange-Quirrel said.

Severus held out the tome and the Dark Arts professor gripped it, but Snape held firm for a moment.

"An interest in alchemy?" Snape asked quietly.

"A passion of m – mine," Quirrel said, stuttering and stupid once more, a transition lasting a fraction of a second.

Snape stared at him, letting go of the book.

"I can always advise you if asked," Snape said.

"Oh – why thank y – you, Severus. So k – k – kind. I should hardly th – think I know a thing about p – potions, honestly," the Defence against the Dark Arts professor admitted, a steely eye on Snape. "Probably only as much as what you know about d – d – defence."

Snape's jaw clenched horribly, his eyes narrowed, and Quirrel moved away immediately, heading out of the door.

_I should think I know a damn sight more than you, you stupid fraud,_ Snape thought as he watched the retreating back. _And I happen to know a great deal about both Alchemy- what's under the school- and the Defence of it… the real question is this; how do you?_


	18. The Problem with Doors

_This was the sort of chapter that I hate writing. I hope it's easier to read than it was to create- a few very important things happen in it that I know at least a few of you have been waiting for, and I don't want anyone to feel disappointed. Also, to give you a feel of where we are in the story, this is the 1/3__rd__ mark of the second book. There will be four books in total, unless I feel the need to conclude the story in some way. I'm half-way through writing the third book and I'm in the process of rewriting this one._

_Peace, please enjoy- my apologies if it's not up to standards… G.L.

* * *

_

"_Quirrel_?"

"No, Professor Snape, I am still Albus Dumbledore, as far as I'm aware."

Snape stood gaping for a moment. He vaguely took in the door swinging to a close behind him- the Headmaster's office was as warm and elegant as it always was and the man himself was sat behind his desk with numerous parchment piles strewn across it, steeping his fingers and twinkling his eyes maddeningly as was his wont.

"What?" Snape asked distantly.

"You called me Professor Quirrel, Severus. You ought to get away from your cauldrons and dungeons once in a while; the fumes will get to you, you know."

Snape fought back a growl.

"No," he said through his teeth. "I wasn't – I – oh, Merlin, you know what I meant."

Dumbledore cocked his head enquiringly.

Snape pushed his irritation down and said slowly, "I was asking 'Quirrel' in regards to the _certain_ _object_ currently hidden in the school. An object that we're supposed to keep extremely secret… and guard with whatever skills we can…"

"Sit down, Severus," the Headmaster said. "Would you like a lemon drop?"

"No thank you, to either, _sir_. May I ask why Quirrel would be included in the defence of such an object? The man's a… he's…"

"The Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor. Who better to help guard the stone?"

"He's an idiot."

"Irrelevant," Dumbledore said crisply. "That is your personal opinion- fortunately, you are a professional, and won't let said opinions stand in the way of your colleague assisting the school."

"He's… he's untrustworthy. _He can't be trusted_."

"Why would you think that, Severus?"

"Because… well, let me see, in the staffroom earlier today I saw him reading up on… on…"

Snape suddenly realised how weak his argument was. He stopped talking, feeling very slightly embarrassed.

Dumbledore just watched him for a moment, and then he took off his spectacles and, like an old bad habit, cleaned them methodically before replacing them and taking a breath.

"Severus, what is Professor McGonagall's trial to the Chamber of Desire?"

Snape narrowed his eyes, but went along with, "I don't know Headmaster."

"And Professor Flitwick's?"

"I – I don't know any of the other Professors' trials."

"And what makes you think it would be any different for the rest of the staff?"

Snape conceded, bowing his head and staring at the wooden floor of the office, with murderous thoughts playing through his mind. _If I have to catch him in the act then fine. I will._

"Do you need anything else, Severus?"

Snape excused himself, fuming, and marched stoically back to his dungeons, trying to make his mind play on other things.

_Forget it for the moment,_ he told himself. _You're right of course, but there's nothing to be done yet. Let's think about… about the order you're collecting later on. Bloody lazy apothecary, not even mailing to their best customers._

He knew perfectly well his order was more than four post Owls at a time could manage, but the thought of making the trip to London in his spare time this evening was even more infuriating.

He dwelt on that for a while, only half-heartedly taking some points off students for running in the halls and he walked on. He put his hand on the receipt in his pocket from the Knockholt branch of _Sage and Bristol: Precious and Potent!_

Out of nowhere, suddenly, something hit him on the face. He started violently after being interrupted from his thoughts, looking up to see Peeves floating above him in the ceiling holding armfuls of Dungbombs.

* * *

Harry smirked as he saw Snape attempting to shout down Peeves. He'd been tailing him silently since he saw him on the fourth floor and this was quite an entertaining respite for such a boring walk.

He knew where Snape's office was, where his quarters were and where the potions stores were, but something told him there were more places Snape only went in the school, and he'd love to find out where… he couldn't kill the fucker in public, but he was planning for a day to come very soon where he would see Snape dead at his feet.

Harry's eyes fell upon a folded piece of parchment on the floor by Snape's foot, then. He frowned slightly, wondering what the Potions Master would have had in his pocket and actually managed to drop.

_Leave it? Look?_ He considered for a short time before his inquisitive side won over- in the ensuing confusion of Snape trying to curse Peeves while being pelted with Dungbombs he raised his hand towards Snape's legs and the piece of parchment that had drawn his eye.

A few emotionless seconds later Harry had Snape's note in his hand. He snuck off before anyone was any wiser, heading to a quiet corridor before opening it.

Reading it he frowned, trying to discern the blotted, spidery scrawl covering it, before realising it was a list of potions ingredients.

He scanned them, disappointed, until his eyes reached the bottom, where it said, 'Please collect the ingredients within working hours' and it was followed by that day's date. He had to sit for a second, thinking quietly, until he realised what a good hand fate might have just dealt him.

_Let's see how my beloved potions teacher reaches London when he needs to…

* * *

_

The rain beat down hard on the front stained-glass windows of Malfoy Manor. Occasionally a flash of lightning would illuminate the atrium more than the chandelier could, as though a thousand more candles were flickering on and off in chorus. The rumbling thunder couldn't be heard through the wards, but somehow Narcissa felt every vibration in her heart.

She stood on the bottom step of the marble staircase, ready to go to the front door and open it, greeting the visitor. High-ranking visitors and family- no matter what their blood status was- were always greeted in person at the door, never by a house-elf; as though to add insult to injury, Narcissa would be the first to welcome her brother-by-marriage into their home.

Lucius paced about the hall in his finest formal dress. Looking at him, Narcissa saw a complex play of emotion that he didn't care to hide in private- frustration, anger and cold reluctance to name but a few. His grey eyes caught the lightning horribly. He hated his half-brother, of that there was no doubt. But he couldn't stand lateness all the same… people being late to a visit was worse than criminal, in his eyes.

Narcissa watched him turn on his heel and begin pacing to the other side of the atrium. His robes billowed about behind him- he looked as though he was contemplating whether or not to ride out to war, as opposed to awaiting the imminent arrival of Saevus Malfoy.

A small cough directed her attention to the glowing doorway that led into the Drawing Room on her left. She could see the foot of their other guest and the corner of the armchair she occupied through the door, but nothing else without moving closer.

She'd never met this woman, this muggle stranger by the name of Marilyn, but she'd met others in the same organisation. When Narcissa re-entered the room she'd see the scarred mouth and odd eyes once more- one side green, the other side yellow. The green eye was framed with a perfect black ring that indicated her status as a Marksman.

The very presence of this mysterious Marilyn had extinguished any hopes she'd foolishly harboured about her husband being wrong and Saevus Malfoy not coming to their house.

_What is so important about these particular creatures that Lucius tolerates their presence in our house?_ She wondered petulantly. _Where does Saevus come into it?_

When the knock rang out, she at first thought she'd imagined it. There was no visible reaction from the foot in the chair but Lucius had stopped pacing, hunched and rigid, caught mid-thought.

She looked with a cold fear in her stomach at the ancient oak doorway at the other end of the hall. Lightning flashed a head-shaped silhouette in the stained-glass wreath in the centre of the huge doors. The image burned into her eyes. Time seemed frozen.

All at once Lucius span to her, glaring, stinging her without any words being said and reminding her of her duty.

She stepped, concentrating on one foot in front of the other, schooling her expression into indifference with every click of her high heels on the wooden floor.

Quickly, far too quickly, she was there. With a wave of her wand the door unlocked and began to heave itself open, a crack of darkness appearing in the centre of the huge oak doors, and rain began to dribble down the corners of the opening.

As they opened further rain blew in, wetting not only the floor and the Persian rug but the hem of her dress-robes. She felt some spatters on her face.

The doors were open. She stepped backwards as the figure's presence was confirmed- at the same time he stepped forwards. The rain seemed to follow him in; a pool began forming at his feet as he stepped forwards again fluidly. Narcissa didn't even raise her wand and the doors closed again, quicker than they opened.

A mocking smile was all that was visible under the hood… that, and the glint of fangs at its corners.

She tried to say 'Welcome' but nothing would work- she felt like a wax-model standing in front of him, a figure who had haunted her dreams for so long, embodied in his cold, dead flesh once more. In her home. In front of her.

"Narcissa," Saevus Malfoy hissed with a grin.

* * *

It was Wednesday 30th October.

He'd done it the old-fashioned way, in the end. None of the unlocking charms he knew had allowed him entry, and when he'd slipped into his centre and _felt_ the magic it hadn't been the usual wet silk-sheet feeling he knew, it had been a prickly, numbing layer he'd not been able to touch to move, so he'd used his lock-set to unlock Snape's office door.

The office itself was exactly as he'd expected it to look. Stone floors and walls, an ebony desk in the middle, fire embers being the only red thing in the room, parchment not strewn everywhere as was the Headmaster's fashion but rather ordered into neat stacks on the desk, black-wood cabinets crawling up the walls behind the desk, and so on. The silver Quidditch House Cup glittering in a stone alcove to Harry's right was the only thing in the room that looked regularly polished.

He began to search for a hiding place, closing the door behind him and raking the room with his eyes.

_There's the fireplace, but there's no guarantee that will stay unlit,_ he thought to himself. _The alcoves aren't big enough. Under the desk? You can see it from the doorway, and even if he missed me, if he sat down his legs would be on me._

He walked further into the room, looking at the cabinets at the back. He craned his neck- _aha,_ he thought. _This has potential…_

The cabinets crawled up the walls into near-darkness, but Harry thought he might be able to see a gap between the arched stone ceiling and the tops of them in the shadows.

He went into the gap between two of the cabinets, just wide enough to fit his shoulders when he stood between them, and put his back flat against one of them. He pushed up with his legs on the other one, feeling his back slide up further. He placed a foot higher than the other and carefully, his robes trailing underneath him, he walked up the side of one, his back supported by the other.

Halfway to the top he nearly slipped and fell but he managed to support himself- until he regained his footing- with his hands.

In eleven minutes he was at the top, and two minutes after that the school bell rang.

_Thank god for that,_ Harry thought. He'd timed it perfectly. It was the end of dinner.

* * *

Harry made to exit the Potions Master's office as soon as Snape himself had. He was furious, thinking to himself as he climbed down the cabinets.

_Why had I never heard of this before?_ He wondered. _It's so simple… there are fires everywhere in the school._

He went to the fireplace and saw that, yes, there was this strange powder in a large pot on the mantle. Snape had grasped a small handful, muttering to himself, as soon as he'd entered the office. He'd thrown it into the fire, saying an address clearly, and stepped through.

_What a ridiculously useful invention_, Harry thought. _Why haven't I read of it… is it illegal?_

He wouldn't put such a trivial thing as the law past Snape. He accepted that maybe it was just something so common to wizards that it wasn't worth the trouble of putting it in books, but something made him think that the students weren't supposed to be able to use it.

He felt a smile spread as he pulled out his chest, enlarged it on the cold floor of the office and opened it with the combination 1-3-4-2. Pulling a large, empty glass vial from his apothecary he dipped it into the pot and filled it to the brim with the grey powder. He repeated this with another four empty vials of the same size. The surface of the powder in the pot on the mantle didn't even look touched.

He now had the powder, and provided it would work from any fire in the school he had access to this incredible system.

He closed the trunk and opened it again at 1-3-2-4, a single compartment down from his apothecary and the third smallest of all 24. He put the vials carefully in, closed the trunk, and shrunk it back to pocket-size once more.

As he moved towards the door he saw something on a shelf that made him double-take- it was a black tome entitled _Mind Magics_. He grinned wider, thinking to himself that after so much wondering at the Weasley twins' apparent telepathy there must be some sort of explanation- and hopefully instruction- provided in this book.

He decided to steal it, consequences be damned. He put it in the library of his trunk.

Feeling accomplished, he left the office. He looked either way, and then fell into his centre delicately, sensing the presences closest to him. Down the hall to his right there were two people in whispered conversation… he didn't push his luck and try to eavesdrop.

He turned to the left and began walking up the stone stairs there, working in his head a route back to the tower.

It wasn't until he reached the entrance hall that he realised someone was following him.

Walking up the stairs and continuing towards the huge staircase-room he tried to detect who it might be- it wasn't the same person spying on him as before, he realised. It was someone completely different. They sounded like a careless but enthusiastic student trying to be sneaky. Someone fat, if their breathing was anything to go by.

He didn't bother trying to imagine why they'd be following him, but he decided if a student was stupid enough to try to follow him without being detected it might be worth having a little fun in finding out.

He went up and down numerous staircases in the stair room until he came out on a floor somewhere- he had no idea where it was, he just kept walking along. He'd never seen this part of the castle before. He turned a corner to a dead end, quickly unlocked a door at the end of it with his art, opened it a margin and then slammed it. The handle on the door, and old fashioned ring one, shook and tapped against the wood. Harry darted away to the side to hide in an alcove.

A few seconds later a figure shuffled in- his breathing was fast and short, and he looked so pleased with himself Harry barely recognised him. It was either Crabbe or Goyle, one of Draco's goons. He's never bothered to learn which was which.

The fat idiot stared at the door with the swinging handle, debating with himself over whether to go for the others or whether to go in by himself. It took him a long time to decide, but eventually he steeled himself, cracked his knuckles and moved to the door.

_I've no idea what classroom that is,_ Harry thought, watching from the shadows,_ but I'll lock it as soon as he's inside and let him sweat a little. _

The huge Slytherin, whichever one it was, turned the handle very suddenly and leapt inside, the door swinging shut behind him. Harry, grinning like a wolf, waved his hand and locked the door.

Seconds later there was a scrabbling at it- Harry fought not to laugh, walking away from it, feeling exceptionally good about himself. The scrabbling became frantic banging, muffled shouts accompanying it. Harry frowned, stopping in his tracks.

_Is he overreacting or what?_ He thought. He made to continue walking around the corner when he was stopped again by the sudden sound of a blood-curdling scream and what sounded like a lion roaring, shaking the torch brackets on the walls. Harry stared at the door, not realising he'd turned around. Bangs were heard against the door, shaking it on its hinges, rattling the wall enough to shake dust loose from the stonework. Wet slapping sounds echoed in Harry's ears.

_What the fuck…_

The scream cut out, and everything came to rest again as though nothing at all had happened.

Harry stood for a while after all the noise had stopped. He was wondering if he'd actually heard his ears correctly, and seen what he had. Something was playing around in his head, something he'd subconsciously heard that led him to realise something had just happened that should not have happened. He couldn't identify it.

_A Gryffindor would check it…_ he thought. _But I think I just killed someone, without even meaning to. That would mean I'm Shujin at the moment._

Harry sniffed. "Shame," he said at the doorway, turning on his heel with a grin and walking away, fighting the strange sensation of causing a death he didn't actually mean to.

_I have astronomy in a few hours, _he realised, moving on with his day.

* * *

He only went to breakfast next morning to see if there was any sign of Draco's friend, but no, there was only one at the Slytherin table with Malfoy himself. The blonde-haired prick and his oaf mate looked confused and even slightly worried, Harry saw with delight.

However, no notices were read out about the missing one. Harry assumed most of the school hadn't noticed yet, it probably hadn't been brought to the attention of the staff.

It was Halloween that day and Harry was planning on paying Mike a visit in the evening.

The school would hold some sort of feast, he'd heard, and that would be the perfect time to leave.

He went to his Thursday lessons- charms (in which he was steadily improving), Defence with his most idiotic professor, Transfiguration (which he still excelled at) and Herbology to end the day- Ron and Hermione, he vaguely noticed, had some sort of stupid row.

After Herbology dinner wasn't served straight away- the feast would start at eight. He went to his dorm to prepare his things as well as talk to Mike through his raven.

'_Mike'_ he sent as he locked the door and pulled out his trunk. '_You busy_?'

'_No_,' he heard back, the strange, genderless voice echoing around his head. '_I finished for the day_. _How you doing? I have things I need to tell you_.'

'_Good_,' Harry said, pulling out his sword. '_I'm coming to_ _visit_.'

'_That may not be a good idea, kid,_' Mike sent back. '_I think they might be watching my flat._'

'_I won't be using the front door, I'm coming by fire_.'

'_How the hell did you get floo powder in Hogwarts_?'

'_I'll tell you later on. I'll be there at around eight_.'

'_It's_ _your funeral mate. I'll make sure I'm ready. Are you sure about this_?'

'_See you at eight_,' Harry sent, ending the conversation and thanking Mar mentally.

He whistled to himself as he checked his weapons, excited and yet slightly apprehensive about returning to London once again. He put on his cloak with the magically expanded insides so that he could carry his sword inconspicuously, got his things ready, filled some of his pockets with useful little items and strapped his dagger to his belt and then re-shrunk his trunk, putting it in one of his pockets.

He was ready to return to London.

* * *

A few hours later his plan was foiled ever-so-slightly when he realised that not every student intended on going to the feast on time, if at all. He was waiting in the common room, glaring at everyone near him, sitting on an armchair in the corner waiting for the bell to ring.

A few minutes later it did- there was a swell of activity, but several students didn't move. Harry looked at them, either examining the products of their shopping trip or doing homework, then at the fire. He looked back at them.

_You fucks,_ he thought viciously. _Why aren't you hungry?_

He got up from his chair, looking mournfully at the fire, and stepped out of the portrait hole after some sixth-year students that didn't notice him. They moved down through the school, laughing and japing like normal schoolkids, and Harry scowled at their backs. Eventually, with nobody behind him, he darted into a classroom.

He didn't know what floor he was on, but the classroom was old and dusty and had nothing in it. No fireplace.

_Shit._

He left it and tried another one, with the same result. Eventually he ran down what he recognised as the Defence corridor and went to his own DADA classroom, one that he knew to have a fireplace in it. He stopped with a hand on the doorknob- he could hear muffled sounds inside. He put his ear to the door and heard whispering.

He turned the handle very slowly, peering into the classroom, and the whispering laughter cut out quickly. He distinctly heard the sound of a zip being done up.

Harry was incredulous as he closed the door, hearing the giggles start up again. He walked down the corridor, fuming that one of the few classrooms he actually knew to have a fireplace in was occupied by two lusting students.

He tried another one- not only no fireplace, but one that had evidently had Peeves in it very recently.

_Fucking school,_ he thought furiously, turning a corner. He stopped dead when he saw Quirrel hurrying down the other end of the corridor.

There was a moment of stunned silence as the professor rounded another corner and went out of sight.

_What are you doing, Professor?_ Harry wondered. It was undoubtedly Quirrel, he'd seen the turban. Harry walked towards where he'd seen the professor come from, staring down an apparently boring hallway, then followed where he'd seen Quirrel go… it led to the staircase room. Quirrel was hurtling down staircases unlike anything Harry had seen- he was heading to the ground floor, towards the feast.

_Oh FUCK,_ Harry thought. _He must have seen me. He must be warning Dumbledore._

He turned out of the staircase room and ran for a second, then stopped himself.

_No, hold on,_ he thought. _I saw him, I'm certain he didn't know I was there. Even if he'd seen me, how would he know what I was doing? I could just say I was lost._

He considered, standing for a moment, wondering what to do.

Then the smell hit him.

_What in the name of all things holy is that?_ He thought, scowling at the stench. It wasn't very strong yet, but it was coming from where Quirrel had come from. _Did you set off a Halloween prank, Professor?_

Harry walked down, the indescribable smell getting stronger, and came out in a larger corridor. He looked around to his left, frowning, then to his right.

He walked on further, following his nose, using his Art also to determine whatever it could be that was making such a horrendous smell, until he stepped out into a larger hallway and stared straight ahead of him.

There was a second of stunned amazement, something Harry rarely ever felt.

"You're having a laugh," he said vaguely.

The troll was unlike anything he'd ever seen. He'd read about them but all of his knowledge flew from his head in the face of it. It wasn't facing him, but was walking into a room off to the side, dragging a club the size of a small tree behind it.

_This is insane. This can't be happening… this is a fucking school._

Harry walked forwards as though he wasn't in control of his own body, towards where the troll had gone from the corridor, then stopped himself.

_What am I doing? If this is some insane prank or accident, this is exactly the distraction I need to get to London unnoticed._ He considered. _If Quirrel found it and was warning the other teachers, they'll be here any moment. I need to get out of here._

He turned away from where it had gone, and began to walk. He shook his head, not quite believing what he'd seen… it's all very well in a book, but seeing it in person was something else.

The scream stopped him- this time it was a female.

Harry thought, _You're joking,_ once again as he turned around. He had such an unnerving sense of Déjà vu, as though this was an opportunity to redeem himself for yesterday.

It was the same thing again, almost. Screams from a room. Female screams… _I've never killed a woman, I don't think, _he thought. _But then this wasn't me doing it- this was an accident. I didn't tell the troll to go in there._

Another, more desperate scream… bangs and crashes… _This is ridiculous._

_What the fuck do I do?_

Harry blinked once, then leant forward, running full pelt towards the door he'd seen the troll go into.

Magic gave him speed. Wind flew around him as he reached it and swept in, drawing Mito Nobunaga's katana. His feet weren't on the ground. Everything was a blur.

* * *

Hermione had wet herself when the troll picked her up. It was holding her up now, by a single leg, crushing her ankle. She felt urine dribble down her stomach. She was actually past being frozen with fear.

The troll seemed to be transfixed by her school skirt- how it fell towards the ground. It was pitching her every-which way, her limbs flying haphazardly and her head lolling, watching the effect gravity had on her. Apart from her tears she was keeping completely limp.

_Please get bored – please get bored – please get bored and leave me alone…_

She knew trolls didn't eat people. Unless they were extremely hungry they wouldn't even try. But they were like bears in a way, she suspected- they'd kill to protect something, or for the fun of it, then get bored when the victim was dead.

Suddenly a storm of dust was kicked up around the troll and the beast froze in surprise, looking around itself stupidly as the powdery rubble it had created was whipped up as though in a whirlwind.

Hermione closed her eyes, not daring to believe she would be rescued, when something caught her in the side. The breath was pushed from her lungs and she was thrown sideways into the tiled wall of the bathroom- she felt some tiles come loose but she hit the ground before them.

She looked up from the ground, a fountain of water spreading from a broken tap, bruised and battered. She saw the troll stumble, recoiling as though it had been stung. She saw a flash of something metallic- a spurt of blood hit her, spreading from a deep gash that had appeared on the troll's leg.

She wanted to scream, or cry out. The trolls feet thudded around as it stumbled, mirrors smashed as it flailed with its club. She heard it holler in a delayed reaction of pain.

She heard more whooshing sounds, more groans as flesh was cut, and suddenly the entire pile of rubble she was on jumped and rumbled as the beast fell to its knees. She stared into the fire of a bracket on the wall. Tears clouded her vision.

The troll's head thudded to the ground next to her and she blacked out.

* * *

Harry sank into the shadows of the hallway just as the teachers ran into the bathroom- he was completely exhilarated. The adrenaline was pumping and his blood was hot.

He reached up a hand and felt a drop of blood on his face- just one single drop. Otherwise he was pristine. He smelt it on his fingers, shuddered, and rubbed it into his hands… _it had been so long._

He ran off down the hallway, all thoughts of visiting Mike forgotten for the moment. He had all the time in the world. The fight- if it could be called that- with the troll had left him with a furious bloodlust. He was almost aroused.

He realised several corridors away that he still had his sword out. He put it away under his cloak, forgetting and not caring about cleaning it. He continued walking, tiredness catching up on him but somehow still feeling incredible.

He walked on and on, breathing heavily, feeling so wonderful it was as though he was one of the junkies in Southwark who'd just got his fix… he felt free again.

He reached a tower and walked up the stairs, lighting a cigarette before he was outside, and the door slammed behind him as he stepped into the night.

_Thank god for that,_ he thought. He breathed the smoke in deeply, and then he became more aware of his surroundings.

"Smoking'll kill you, Harry Potter."

He turned to Ali's voice in the doorway behind him. He smiled, exhaling through his nose like a dragon, taking in the Ravenclaw's appearance.

"If it's smoking that kills me I've won," he replied.

"I was wondering where you were," Ali said, not sounding as confident as he usually was. "I'm glad I found you."

"Not as glad as I am," Harry met his eyes, a hand on his sword hilt.

"No desperate defence tonight, Harry? No over-exertion and leaps of faith?"

Harry felt as though tonight he could kill Ali, Snape, Malfoy and Dumbledore himself, and his expression said as much.

"You want to have that rematch, Ali? A fair fight, this time?"

"Don't get overconfident, Potter."

"Don't be a _cunt_, Sumesqi."

"What did I say about using my surname?" Ali said, eyes glinting.

"I can't remember- come over here and tell me where I can hear you properly."

The boy grinned, but it lacked something as he said, "I am-"

"A complete son-of-a-bitch, Sumesqi, and I'm in the mood to dispense a little justice."

"_Really._"

"Yes," Harry bit, "_Really_. Get your obsidian hide within my reach."

They stared at each other for a long while, waiting for one to make a move, both completely at ease. Bright, malicious green eyes met Ali's feral ones.

Harry finished the cigarette, throwing it over the edge.

One figure was illuminated from the top by the moon; the other was illuminated from behind by firelight. Hatred crackled the air in between them.

"Not tonight, Harry," Ali said, stepping backwards into shadow. "But some day soon."

"No!" Harry spat in disbelief, not believing that the boy was gone.

The door slammed.

Harry ran towards it, knife out, and threw it open; peering in… there was nobody there.

"_No,_" he hissed in fury, slamming the door with all of his strength.

_I don't believe it.

* * *

_

He got through another four cigarettes, the rest of his open pack, before returning to his tower. He walked as though he was in that insane dream-world he'd visited in his coma… he didn't feel anything, and yet somehow he wasn't as susceptible to his other senses as he was in his centre.

He didn't see another soul until he got to the house tower. He slipped into the common room unnoticed, moving stiffly by then, and when he got to his dorm he conjured a sandwich in the blink of an eye.

Wolfing it down, he climbed into his bed, surrounded by hangings, and fell straight to sleep with his sword in his hands.

_Some day soon indeed, Ali Sumesqi._


	19. The Left Hook

_Not a lot to be said for this one. Another necessary chapter although that may not be clear immediately. The pace picks up a bit from herein._

_There's violence in this chapter and excessive swearing... but if you haven't come to expect that I suggest you reread chapters 1 - 18._

_Cheers for reading, Peace to you, and many thanks for the reviews I haven't had time to respond to. G.L._

* * *

Like a cannonball, a figure in black rolled out of the fire in a green explosion and puff of black, acrid smoke.

Mike stared for a moment, incredulous, before spitting out his coffee in a choke of laughter.

"'O_w much powder did ya use?" _He burst out, still creasing with laughter as Harry Potter stood up in the ruined living room.

"A-" cough "-bit too much, apparently…"

"Drink?" Mike offered, shaking his head, once a moment had passed.

"Yeah, thanks," Harry accepted, following Mike over to the liquor cabinet, eyes scanning the room while coming to his senses. "How are you, Mike?"

"Not too bad, Shujin- was expectin' you a tad earlier, but not to worry, eh?"

"I told you why though," Harry said, squinting at the floor. "Rebecca cornered you in here, right?"

"Indeed. Don't think about i', t'wasn't a big deal. Nothin' I ain't handled before, anyways."

Harry took the proffered glass, eyes still on the stains on the floor. He was distracted then by a _caw_ and sudden feathery weight on his shoulder.

"Hello, Mar," Harry said with a half-smile.

"Harry Potter," Mar said back. Despite the harsh tone and croak, Harry sensed affection in the bird's greeting. "I am where you sent me, still."

"I can see," Harry said. "You've done bloody well."

"It's been stellar, mate. Right useful little bird, init. Though it's been a tad strange chattin' away to a Raven, I tell ya…"

Harry laughed slightly, looking over to Mike Chow, before visibly recoiling. His Asian associate had a huge white scar running down his cheek.

"What the fuck, Mike? You said she hadn't done anything!"

Mike stared at him, frowning. "Compared to 'ow she normally is," he told Harry, holding up his hand, "this is nothin'."

Harry stared at the offered limb. Three of the fingers on Mike's left hand were missing their ends, cut to stumps at the second knuckle.

"I'll cut her eyes out," Harry said softly, still in disbelief. "I'll cut them out with her own fingernails."

Mike snorted, saying, "You should've 'eard some o' the shit I was sayin' to 'er during it. Make _that_ look like narration from a kiddie's book."

Harry didn't laugh, but stared down at the floor.

"Is that all yours?"

"Nah," Mike said, his voice quieter now. "That's me assistant's. Hume knows tha' no matter what she does to _me_ she ain't gettin' shit, so she turned on 'er. If you're gonna go after 'er, do it fo' that. I don' give a shit 'bout me, but _she_ was innocent."

"Jesus," Harry breathed. "We'll get them, Mike. Don't doubt it for a second."

"Yeah, well," Mike said, downing some more whisky before refilling his glass. "Let's get to it, eh? Take a seat, Shujin… I 'ave to tell you all abou' this _wonderful_ ol' colleague o' mine, who's goin' to help us break into Gringotts."

"This is the South African guy?"

"Aye. Right useful bastard but still nothin' more 'en that… a _bastard_. 'Airless as the day 'e was born, short, fuckin' _violent_ like nothin' you've ever seen, ragin' lunatic…"

"London's very finest, then, eh?" Harry asked, settling into a debris-covered sofa.

"Absolutely. Once e's in disguise you won' even recognise 'im if 'e's been your brother all 'is life. Speakin of- ya know who 'e's gonna be then?"

"Yes- this is the only picture I could find of him but it should do alright."

Harry swept out his shrunken trunk from his robes, enlarging it as it came, and opened it rapidly with a tapped combination. Mike shook his head enviously at how Harry handled his belongings, but Harry himself didn't notice as he took out a thin leather tome from his library compartment.

He opened it to a marked, full-page moving portrait and handed it to Mike.

"Well _hello_," Mike said, whistling slightly, brown eyes wide. "Ya sure abou' this Shujin?"

Harry nodded, sipping the spiced liquor.

"Not t'worry… Taye shouldn' recognise 'im, but 'e'll be able to become 'im. Even if 'e does recognise 'im, he'll prob'ly think it'll just add to the fun."

"Good," Harry said. He smiled at Mike. "How's business?"

* * *

Draco snorted in surprise.

_Don't come home?_ He thought furiously. _Don't come back to my own house, dearest mother? How fucking dare you?_

He stared at the letter in his hands, conscious of himself shaking and telling himself it was in anger. He'd noticed the note, clasped in the beak of his mother's Ninox owl, as he'd returned down to his dormitory that evening, but seeing that there were no additional packages that evidently contained sweets or money, he'd not bothered to open it until just now after dinner.

He read it again, raising it to his eyes, sparing a short glance at the closed door.

'Dearest Draco,' it said. 'Please sign yourself up to stay on for the Christmas holidays of your first year. Your father and I are seeing guests at home during it. We're both very sorry, and will send you extra gifts as recompense, but we shall see you on your next trip home. I hope all is well, Your doting mother, Narcissa.'

_Guests at home?_ He pondered angrily. _I've been there when the worst sort of people have visited… why should now be any different? Why shouldn't I come home… the manor is big enough, I can stay out of their way during it. They barely see me when I'm at home anyway, especially mother._

He shook his head, throwing the letter- crumpled, though he hadn't remembered screwing it up- into the dying fire and his eyes lit up as he watched it flame.

_Well, sod those two,_ he grinned to himself, lying back on his green, silk bed. _I _will_ be on the train home at the start of the holidays whether they like it or not._

He didn't like to go against his parents' wishes and Merlin knew he'd pay for it, but the last words they'd spoken to him on Platform 9¾ rang tauntingly in his head… them telling him they'd see him at Christmas, that they'd miss him, and so on.

And now they didn't want him back at all.

He also had another viable reason to ignore his mother's request… he had a certain special plan for Harry-_scarhead_-Potter on the train home for Christmas, when there would be no teachers patrolling around and it would be just Potter and himself… he could finally pay the bastard back for attacking him time and time again…

He almost fell asleep, dressed fully, with raw thoughts of vengeance slowly roasting in his head, when the dormitory doors burst open and his friend Crabbe stood there, panting, sweating and looking like he'd just had more exertion than he'd ever had in his life.

Draco sneered at him, annoyed at how he'd been interrupted from his thoughts, saying, "What on Earth is wrong with _you_, you fat idiot?"

"Draco -" gasp "- Draco!"

"What?" Draco asked viciously, sitting up suddenly, glaring.

"Professor – Professor Snape! He says to – to come quickly," Draco's crony panted, leaning on the door frame. "He says – he says he's found Goyle!"

"Goyle?" Draco asked, his sharp eyebrow rising into a point. "So? Goyle can come here, can't he? Where's he been?"

But Crabbe's eyes were so wide, his round face so pale, that Draco stood and marched past him, through the door, asking, "Where, Vincent?" over his shoulder.

Crabbe didn't answer, and the sound of him catching his breath soon died behind Draco on the stairs, but he needn't have bothered asking him 'where?' because at the bottom of the stairs stood a very severe, gaunt-looking Severus Snape.

"Mr. Malfoy," the Professor said quietly, somehow awkward. "I'm afraid I have some bad news."

Draco didn't hear him. His eyes were fixed on a pile of shredded, bloody robes, emblazoned with the Slytherin Crest, in his Head of House's hands and he was trying to imagine how he should feel.

* * *

He didn't know what to do.

He couldn't ignore it any more… the owl from the ministry sat before him, staring dolefully around, and Fawkes slumbered peacefully next to his desk. The letter was on the table in front of him.

_Tonight is the third time,_ Albus thought to himself, hands steepled and brow furrowed. _The third time that Harry has left the castle… I knew it from the wards anyway, but this confirms that the Ministry have noticed too._

He sighed, sipping his tea, staring into space.

_They won't be able to tell me where he's going until I tell them who it is that's leaving… and if I tell them Harry Potter is routinely leaving the castle they'll know too. I need to find out another way._

Headmaster Dumbledore poised a quill towards a sheaf of parchment, trying to get his brain to function, sucking slowly on a lemon drop.

After five minutes he gave up thinking about Harry Potter and decided to compose his morning speech on the tragedy that befell a curious first-year Slytherin who decided to ignore his warning about the third floor corridor. He shook his head.

_Tragic_, he thought sadly as he mulled it over.

Of course, what he wouldn't be telling the school is that they'd discovered the door locked from behind, magically, and that they were considering launching an investigation.

Organising his thoughts the Headmaster soon gave up on this too, and decided to go to bed.

_Hogwarts... what is happening to you?_

* * *

'The Five Bodies, compiled and edited by Jarvis Corone.'

Harry glanced through it, before adding it to his open trunk. He put 'Misconceptions of Clairvoyance' back onto the shelf.

He was wearing all-black attire; the only T-Shirt he owned, his boots, his old leather jacket (coloured magically) and a pair of soft jogging trousers he'd borrowed off Mike.

He was inside _Obscuras Books_, a shop on the mouth of Knockturn Alley near Mike's flat and his final haunt for the evening. It sold rare, collector's edition and illegal volumes on just about every aspect of magic. He wished he'd known it was here when he'd stayed in Diagon Alley during the summer- it was an extraordinary place, completely unremarkable on the outside but vertically magically expanded on the interior, with shelves of dusty tomes and leather-bound editions towering upwards so far that when standing on the tattered wooden shop floor it looked as though the walls curved inwards.

Mike, who had stayed behind with a mock-disapproving _tsk_ in his flat, had told Harry of this and another shady bookshop as well as _Flourish and Blott's_ a few roads away and Harry, while being in the area, had decided to stock up.

'_Mar,'_ he sent mentally, his eyes scanning the next shelf in the near-darkness. _'What time is it?'_

His raven, circling outside in the sky, was on the lookout for anyone who might interrupt Harry's late-night shopping spree.

'_Three hours until first-light, Harry,_' he heard back after a moment.

He thanked his familiar and told himself to hurry up.

Soon, after adding 'Amygdala; Brain Sciences and the Arcane''The Dream Mask', 'The Grey Road' and 'Cogitative Progression – Leglimency for the Apt' to his library, he climbed down from the ladder and stretched.

He was getting tired.

_You've gone soft, Shujin,_ he thought disgustedly as he packed away, his eyes drooping. _Back in London for six hours and you can't pull an all-nighter._

He shrunk his things and moved to the back door, slipping into his centre to begin replacing the weak wards and jinxes that had surrounded it.

'_All clear, Mar?'_

He felt the magic, with the texture and sting of nettles, against his fingers as he moulded it back into place.

'_Yes, you are clear.'_

'_Thank you. You can head back to Mike's flat- tell him I'm on my way. If he's still up, that is. In the morning you can head back to Scotland if you like.'_

'_Yes, I will. Goodnight.'_

Harry stepped out into the night, seeing his bird swoop away in the shadows overhead, and ducked low as he began to make his way back to Mike's home, his legs carrying him as his half-conscious mind mulled over the information he'd gleamed from a quick look in those books, imagining having complete control over his mental state.

There was a sudden gust of cold night air that stung his ears, and something moved in his peripheral.

He spun, a hand reaching for his gun, staring into the shadows of a smaller, crooked alleyway leading off Knockturn.

Everything was still for a moment. Harry had no idea what it had been but he'd have sworn it was the swish of a cloak in the wind.

There was no sound, no movement… nothing at all. Not even a cat ran from the alley to ease his worry.

_Who was that?_ He thought to himself, crouching slightly, eyes scanning the darkness furiously. _A teacher from Hogwarts?_

A moment later he scolded himself, utterly disgusted.

_A school teacher? A fucking schoolteacher is the worst you're scared of, now, Shujin? After everything that's happened in this city, you're scared of a cursed Professor._

After a few more moments of standing still, he began to move silently away. He stuck to the pitch darkness next to shop windows, at the sides of the alley, heading towards the square while avoiding the full glare of the moon.

He kept his head down and moved as swiftly as his feet would allow, a chill creeping up his spine, unwilling to allow himself to be spooked so easily but worrying slightly anyway.

_I'm not worried for myself,_ he told himself petulantly. _I've faced vicious killers, magical and not, for so fucking long in London. I can take care of myself. I just don't want them to have any reason to expel me from that school… I want the money. I also need the training. They can't find out I've bee-_

Something clattered behind him, interrupting his inner-monologue.

He spun again, this time with his gun drawn and pointing straight down the alley behind him. He steadied his breathing and lowered his stance, bringing his centre of gravity closer to the ground.

He couldn't see what had clattered, but a moment later that mattered very little because a hand descended onto his shoulder.

He tried to about-turn quickly but found himself on the wrong end of a wand.

There was another moment of eerie stillness as Harry's heart jumped into his throat… he stared coldly at the figure holding the wand. His gun in one hand pointed at the other side of the alley… he considered his options.

From what he could see, this was simply a magical mugger. Dirty, smelly robes- _how the fuck did I miss that smell?-_ with a crooked wand pointed at his nose, sporting long, straggly hair and even, to complete the image, fingerless gloves.

But Harry couldn't see his face, or his eyes.

After a mere moment's hesitation he slowly pulled the gun around, bringing it to rest against the man's chest. The figure didn't move- in fact, in seeing it wasn't a wand, it seemed as though the man _breathed_ slightly in relief.

"Little late, isn't it?" the man said in a hoarse voice. He sounded as though he ate scraps of metal for fun.

_Soon you _will_ be eating metal,_ Harry thought mildly.

"Little late for little boys to be running around? Why don't you just come with me… come with old Gareth, follow him to his home, he'll take good care of you…"

"Lower your wand," Harry instructed him, his voice barely steady. Again, a moment later he psychologically berated himself- _since when do you give people a fucking chance, Shujin!?_

"Come on home with Gareth," the man breathed in his broken voice. His breath stank of rotting foliage and vomit. "Just a little way away… not far, for little boys to run along, not far… come home with Gareth…"

_Shoot him_, Harry told himself. _Shoot the cunt. Shoot him in the fucking heart._

His mind was mostly blank. He swallowed slightly, a lump in his throat, and tried to get a response from his trigger finger.

The man's hand reached up and held Harry by the collar.

_Shoot Him!_ Harry's mind screamed at his non-responsive body. _SHOOT HIM!_

Suddenly a second voice echoed across the cold, black alley.

"Gareth? _Gareth!_" the voice said. It was female. The man in front of him, holding him, a wand in Harry's face, winced and shrugged over slightly. Harry's arm fell to his side. "What in the name of Merlin are you playing at? Get over here, you drunk idiot. _Now._"

The man, after a second, responded stiffly, starting to shuffle across the alley to the silhouette of the woman, who then saw Harry standing there, blank.

"Oh, for the love of – oi, kid… kid!"

Harry's eyes met hers, though hers were shadowed. He didn't want to imagine what he looked like.

"Here," she said, marching over. She smelt bad too, Harry realised vaguely as she shoved something into his hand. "Forget 'bout it all. You 'ear? Ge' home."

When she and the man had gone, he leant down and picked up the gun he'd- at some point- dropped. He didn't know what to feel. He was disgusted… something just was _not_ right.

Still not thinking clearly, he looked in his left hand as the gun was holstered by his right.

A single, grubby little bronze knut sat in his palm.

He glared, blinking, sure the dim light of the dying moon was playing tricks on him, wondering and feeling intense, increasing heat boil up his back and neck, staring at the coin.

Then his head, or something inside it, clunked into place.

Instead of entering any state of heightened emotion he felt nothing but resolve.

He leant down, in a deadly calm, drawing his shrunken trunk from his pocket as his other hand put the coin into a fold of clothing. He enlarged it with a thought, waved a hand over the locks and within moments was tucking it back into his pocket, walking onwards, Mito Nobunaga's Katana sheathed and tucked under his arm.

Moving in what felt like a dream, an eerie state of weightlessness but with the edges of his vision sharpened, he went down numerous twisting, turning little crevices between grey-stone buildings, somehow subconsciously picking up on the trail of his targets.

He had no idea how long had passed but eventually he found them- the man was throwing up in the gutter and the woman was smoking a pipe, leaning against the wall, facing away from Harry.

In a few moments, a blurred memory of flashing scarlet and dark grey light, she had been cut in half at the waist.

Her pieces, the estranged family of her corpse, tumbled silently to the ground, or at least they did to Harry.

Everything was moving so _slowly_, he thought, as he turned to see the man had not noticed his companion had been murdered. The sword in his hand had not a drop of blood on it but the blade was blunted a little from the impact on the wall. Harry's wrist hurt but he wouldn't feel it for a while yet.

He put it first through the man's back, it offering very little resistance, before drawing a long red line down his coat.

_That's a shame,_ he thought. _It was a nice coat._

A few sword strokes later, a flash of glittering steel being the only glint in Harry's eyes, and he turned once more to the woman.

On the way around he noticed, through the narrow end of this small alley, that the sun was rising.

His brain snapped suddenly out of its reverie and he felt _everything_ again… from the pain in his wrist to the warm blood spattered across his face. He smelt the foul stench of it mingling with the ramshackle, rag-built hovels that surrounded him. His eyes burnt with the pale contrast to the night he hadn't realised he'd lost.

_Sunrise_, he thought softly. _You still haven't forgiven me_.

He wasn't sure how long he stood there, but it can't have been for more than a few moments. Knockturn was about to become busier.

Before walking off, despite having already paused to put his sword away and to draw out a thick black cloak to wear, he pulled the grubby bronze knut out of his sleeve and put it on the exposed yellow tongue of the top half of the woman.

"Forget about it," Harry said to the body, his voice low but hard. He stared at her wide, pink-ringed eyes. "You hear? Do you _hear_? Forget about it."

He walked towards Mike's flat, trusting his instinctive direction, a pipe smoking on its own crunching under one of his boots.

He left the 'Go Home' unsaid.

* * *

Hermione stared for a moment, not really believing that Harry Potter had just exploded from the fireplace in front of her.

He stood, brushing himself off before her, not even meeting her eyes. She was the only one in the Common Room and the only one to see it- there were five minutes left until lessons and most students were eating. She'd been sitting there thinking, absorbed in her own thoughts.

And Harry Potter had rolled out in a plume of green flames in school attire, stood up and was, just now, walking off towards the portrait hole. Towards lessons.

He met her eyes before he stepped through. He had a tiny speck of red visible next to his left eyebrow- the only mark on his recently-scrubbed face.

He disappeared through and she stood slowly.

She jumped, realising the bell had rung. She was stuck, completely and utterly, until she'd reminded herself of lessons.

She put Harry Potter- the ever-growing, never-unravelling enigma that he was- to the back of her mind.

* * *

With what was approaching at Gringotts, Harry had taken to withdrawing into himself more often than usual around his classmates, knowing that if all went to plan that he'd not be in the castle for much longer.

It was nearly December- with just a few days to go, Harry had immersed himself in the studies he'd only really be able to get away with at Hogwarts without being tracked. He'd been learning, thoroughly, the theoretical background to all forms of mind magic, from something called Leglimency to the 'Mystikos' spell, a complex Greek ritual that he'd at first suspected the Weasley twins to be using before he realised it was too far out of their league.

He'd also been learning the theory of several darker magical practises, most of which were, some books assured him, almost entirely out of use. There were hints at something called the 'Astral Plane', a practise called Projection which reminded him of basic non-magical meditation but with an arcane twist, and he'd even been dabbling a little into the theoretical practises of Possession.

Amidst the process of organising his increasingly scattered psyche, he'd been studying more runes and combining proper potion rituals together, trying to create more complex protections for both himself and also for his trunk.

In experimenting with it Harry had discovered that the trunk had sustained more damage than he'd realised at the hands of Dumbledore when he'd tried to break into it those months before… the 'ward' system on it, a complex little weave of defensive magic, was a single-use failsafe that would only work once.

However, in having the basis of the defensive ward, Harry had been able to delve into it a little more with his art and, while not being able to repair it exactly, he was working on creating his first runic _Idio Prostasia_… his first Personal Ward scheme.

His plan was that if someone not keyed in personally by him tried to open his trunk by the time they got to the second lock not only would the trunk 'self-destruct' into Harry's care, but the person attempting the break-in would get a little first-hand taste of a healthy covering of Greek Fire.

_That'll surprise Dumbledore if he tries it again,_ Harry had thought viciously. _A dose of flaming vengeance that will only go out if suffocated._

He'd tried, earlier on in the month, to simply let go of the whole holding-himself-back idea while in classes. It had seemed simple enough- no need to bother pretending you aren't very good. He hadn't been consciously holding himself back; he'd simply been trying to stay unnoticed… unfortunately, as Harry Potter, unnoticed was impossible. When he'd started doing his best, however, the Professors had begun piling on extra work for him.

He'd got very little sleep recently. He'd never had time for too much luxury while growing up- sleeping too long usually meant you'd be robbed, if lucky, or killed in your sleep if you were slightly less lucky. Yet another example, he knew, of how Hogwarts had made him soft.

As well as completing the extra schoolwork on his plate, he'd created two more animal runes on his body- the Coyote, whose tricking and disillusion tactics he thought help with the planned heist, and the Owl to assist with mental excursions… the negative points of both included making him slightly more nocturnal, further disrupting his sleeping patterns, but the good outweighed the bad he believed.

He still practised forms and routines with his sword, he exercised religiously every day, he ate a lot (but usually of the food he conjured), he meditated magically and non-magically, he practised spellwork and he also managed to look up more Art of Magic volumes to help him harness his power.

He was very busy.

Whenever he had time, which meant whenever he chose to make time, he would floo from an empty classroom to London to meet Mike and plan for the Gringotts thing.

He'd be back there for a few weeks soon with the Christmas holidays beginning and he couldn't wait to get out of this routine. He would be able to spend time there, properly, as he should do when masterminding something as drastic as this.

He could be free for a bit longer, and he was planning to savour every minute of it.

Unfortunately, he was far too excited about being back in his home to have remembered a very crucial point…

A lot of powerful people wanted him dead.

* * *

"Mr. Potter," a voice said.

Harry stood from the fireplace, stepping out, staring at Albus Dumbledore standing serenely in the corner of the dark classroom as though he'd been waiting for him… which he probably had, Harry reminded himself.

"Headmaster," Harry replied neutrally, dusting his robes off, thinking about what he had on him and what could incriminate him. "Good evening."

"Good evening indeed, Harry."

There were a few moments of awkward silence and Harry didn't meet Dumbledore's eyes. _This is the sixth time,_ he thought. _He was bound to catch on._

"Do you know, Harry," the Headmaster finally said. "It isn't strictly within the school rules to leave the castle premises in the middle of the night… you are technically out-of-bounds."

"Punish me, then," Harry said, finally looking at the sad face of Dumbledore. "Nobody told me I couldn't go back to London once in a while."

"Ah, but for two reasons you should not, Harry; the first is that the Christmas Holidays are just a few days away. You, as I understand it, have elected to return to… to London… this year?"

"That is correct, Professor. It's for that reason, amongst other things, that I've been going," Harry said. _How much do you know,_ he wondered as he continued, "I need to keep up my contacts if I'm going to have a place to stay this Christmas."

_Which is true,_ he decided. That evening, before returning, he'd made reservations at the tavern he'd stayed at towards the end of summer in Knockholt Square.

"I see… there are school owls available for the students' use, Harry, but let me continue. The second reason is that if other students were to discover a way to return to their homes then very few would be here for classes. Hogwarts is an institution that runs full boarding, as you know, Harry."

_At least he's treating me like a person,_ Harry thought.

"I don't plan on sharing my knowledge with anyone else, Headmaster. If you command to me to stop using floo then I will, but I'm not going to be spreading it around and, besides, would you not agree that the 'home' I'm returning to is a little different to that of the other students'?"

Dumbledore smiled as though bemused before asking, "Would you mind telling me where you're going at Christmas, Harry? I'd like to simply _suggest_ you consider your relatives' house…"

"I don't have any relatives," Harry said. "They died on 31st October quite a few years ago- you might have heard about it. I can give you an idea where I'm going, but in return I'd like an idea of what you tried to drug me with."

Dumbledore sighed in what seemed to be exasperation, surprising Harry, but what surprised him more was the response, "I didn't try to drug you Harry. Normally the parents or guardians of the student give permission for a dose of _Altusaepes_, but legally I don't have to ask an individual student to take it when it is for their own good."

_Altusaepes, altusaepes, altusaepes, he said 'Altusaepes' and I'm going to find out what the fuck it is,_ Harry thought rapidly. _Altusaepes._

"Alright," Harry said, reigning in his emotion. "I'm staying in an Inn in London. Since I've discovered I have a little money that my parents left me I'm done with sleeping on roofs... unless for some reason I need to run off again."

He tried to leave the threat veiled.

"I see," the Headmaster said. "I think you'll discover your parents left you a fair amount of money, Mr. Potter, and I hope you have the wherewithal to complete your education before pursuing the spending of it all. You will become a very great wizard one day, Harry… a very great one indeed."

"I know, Headmaster, I plan to," Harry said, fighting his instinct to mention something that could be related to the Gringotts heist. "Is there anything else?"

Dumbledore gave Harry that strange, piercing stare and Harry instinctively cleared his thoughts, staring at the ground in front of him.

After a moment the Headmaster said to him, "Please use the Hogwarts Express to return to London for your Holidays, Harry."

As the old man walked towards the door Harry stared at his back, not believing his luck.

"Oh," Dumbledore said to him finally, without turning in the doorway. "And… five points from Gryffindor for being out of bounds this late. Ensure Caretaker Filch doesn't catch you on your way to the dorms unless you want more points deducted, and if I hear of your outstanding performance in lessons waning because of these little night-time excursions you'll hear from me again. Have a Merry Christmas, Harry."


	20. The Return, Pt I

_This will probably be the last update in a little while amidst my relocation. I'm sorry to leave you with a cliffhanger, but what kind of bastard would I be if I didn't? Not a very good one. This will be my last for a while because I don't have time today to edit another chapter too._

_To all who reviewed, thank you._

_I'm trying to maintain a foreign writing style, a plot structure unlike anything I've ever written in a genre I'm not comfortable with, and at the same time maintain a balance that I think fanfiction should have- the knife-edge of realistic characterisation, reaction and occurence balanced with a sequence of events that concurs with canon._

_Why am I doing this? Everyone writes for their own reasons and I have many, the simplest being that it's an excercise in literature that I want to explore. It's also the sort of story I personally would enjoy reading- mostly- and I appreciate it isn't for everyone._

_There has been a fairly negative reaction to the 'smoking-angle'. I live in London now and although I travel a lot and will soon be leaving, I also lived in London just a few years after this story is set. To those who dislike it, I don't see why I should justify it but I've been 'advised' to.** I am a smoker**. I get through between 10 and 40 a day, depending on the circumstances. I have smoked since I was ten. Does this make me less of a person? Does it make me retarded? I wasn't aware it did, but apparently there's some insecurity about reading a character who smokes when they're young._

_To those who have these insecurities... grow the fuck up. Seriously. Stop whining in PMs (and a few in reviews) about Harry Potter being a smoker. I can't understand the logic in it being alright to write about Harry fucking Snape in the arse in some people's stories, but in mine I get an earful because he smokes? Are people not aware of how many people on this planet _do_ smoke, or do drugs, or drink excessively? Why is there such a taboo on this _realistic_ aspect of my story? I'm simply confused. I think it's immature when you could be criticising my awkward writing style, my racist character, the murder content, the blood and gore, the gradual descent into a really disgusting anti-hero, and so on... when you could criticise any of that, you go for 'smoking is evil.'_

_If you don't like it, you're more than welcome to not read it. But I smoke, and so does Unforgiven's Harry Potter. If I raise offense in some way, I say grow up, because honestly there's more serious shit going on than that. All I ask is that people stop talking about it. This is the character, he's had a damn hard life, he will continue to, and when you are that age, in London, in those circumstances, the chances are you'll end up a smoker._

_Although to a lesser extent, **I fucking did**._

_Please, put the 'constructive' element into critiscism unless it isn't on this site. If it isn't, bitch all you like._

_And I do have to chuckle about one thing- I was considering, when I began this story, making Harry a smack addict. Fortunately for people who are offended by that sort of thing it didn't go with my intended plot._

_Sigh sorry for the rant. To everyone else, I hope you're enjoying the story... peace, I'll see you soon. G.L._

* * *

"M – mr. P – p – Potter!" 

Harry raised his eyes slowly.

"P – please try to concentrate. I know i – it's the last day of term b – but there are still m – m – more _important_ things to b – be _learnt!_"

Harry frowned before flashing an indulgent smile at Professor Quirrel. Had he been paying attention he'd have noticed his Defence teacher was slightly more _absent_ on that last day than he usually was from his wits. The stutter sounded almost practised.

As it was, Harry was _planning_… he had no time for frivolities with retarded teachers. Not at this stage.

He scratched the runes on his right arm subconsciously as he copied more notes from 'Goblin Banking 101' and 'Why Wizards Prefer Gringotts' onto parchment.

_The thing is,_ he considered privately, _if they catch this Taye bastard trying to rob the place there'll probably be some sort of witch-hunt, maybe an Inquisition from the Ministry as to how safe people's funds are after the attempted robbery on the first day of term combined with this. _

From what he'd read, an Inquisition into Gringotts- which British ministers had been threatening for decades- would lead to the next Goblin Rebellion. Harry didn't care for Goblins, and he cared even less for Wizards… he couldn't be certain whether a Rebellion would destroy any chances he had of getting his money or whether it would help him cover his tracks.

He rubbed his eyes, hard, thinking, _I hate Politics. I want my money, I want a flat in London, and I want to live the rest of my life in some semblance of luxury._

Hermione looked over and _tsked_ loudly at what he was doing. He contemplated spitting on her hair, a smile forming on his face, before slamming her textbook- _hard_- on her fingers as she held the page open with just a blink of his eyes.

_Tut at me, will you, you stupid bitch? After I saved your life?_

She went to the hospital wing and Harry spread himself out on the bench, glad of more space, opening 'Modern Magical Economics and Financing a Hidden World' on the surface too.

He didn't look up when Quirrel walked past a few minutes later, he merely continued with what he was doing and, using one hand, slid his finished assignment over towards the teacher.

His books were disguised as defence textbooks- Quirrel would only see him doing extra-credit work.

Quirrel moved on. So did Harry.

* * *

"High… high hedges. Hedges. 'High Hedges'… that's fucking _useful_, isn't it?" 

He stared at his Latin translation of 'Altusaepes', a search of which had returned no results at all, and sighed in grief.

_High Hedges,_ he thought in wonder and frustration. _So, a barrier of some kind. I'd gathered that. To… to stop people going somewhere? Literally or figuratively? To… block something? Su Li said it couldn't be natural magic…_

Thinking of Su Li he wondered if the Ravenclaw was having any more luck than him- in none of his huge collection of books was there a single reference to the potion name he'd told her and she hadn't known anything off-hand, but had promised to research it for him.

_I'm beginning to think you made that up_, Harry thought to himself, frowning. _Altusaepes… does that sound like something Dumbledore would, with his extraordinary sense of humour, decide to deliberately let slip?_

He knew the answer and was infuriated with himself for it. He lifted a hand to the rune meaning 'Dragonfly' on his lower-arm and pinched it, trying to elicit some damned response from it.

_I didn't want to adapt to this place in the way of being _Blindly Manipulated_ like every other little lamb here,_ he screamed in his head.

He left the books on the library table, swinging his school cloak on, irritable and unduly apprehensive as he returned to his lunch hour on the last day of term.

The Christmas Holidays were finally there.

It felt that, to Harry, he'd been at Hogwarts School for far longer than just three and a half months. It seemed that, as much as he resented the place, the people and how it was run, he somehow belonged there. He'd become a student of Hogwarts a lot faster than he'd have liked to.

_Let me consider,_ he thought, moving towards the great hall. _I hate Dumbledore for being so… so… I don't even know! He's just fucking infuriating. He's negligent and he all but stole from me. There- I hate him for that. I hate him for allowing bastards like Ali in as students and for letting that fucker Snape actually _teach_ here. I hate the cold, confining walls of this shit hole. _

He also hated the fact that he felt safe in Hogwarts with vehemence. 'This is my fortress' Godric Gryffindor had famously written. 'And it shall always remain safe for all those welcome within.'

_Somehow I doubt he accounted for the tenacity of London's dirtiest dealers, _Harry thought. Mike's parting warning rang in his head.

He sat down at Gryffindor table, glaring at the head of the school as the man blithely and ignorantly ate his food. The large platters surrounding him filled with food and the pitcher to his right with Pumpkin juice.

He took a swig from his hip flask, the contents being just water, before beginning to pile his plate.

All he could put his mind on during his meagre meal were two things- a short term longing for some nicotine and a longer term wish to be back in London for good.

_The sooner the better_, he thought, in both cases. The longest he'd ever stayed in one place since his liberation was in this castle.

He finished up, looking up to the head table to see that Dumbledore had already left. He was tempted to disobey Dumbledore's direct instruction to not leave for the Holidays by fire… he was simply in that sort of mood… but he knew that the longer he stayed in the old man's 'demure and simple' column the longer he'd be able to work an escape after the Gringotts heist.

_Not long now,_ Harry thought excitedly.

He ran through things in his head again- the entire operation was stored safely in there, any notes he made being burnt after he'd memorised them. The books he'd lifted from _Obscuras_ and the other places had served many useful purposes- some of them helped him organise his mind, remembering details and plans for longer and also protecting them in case anyone had the ability and knowledge to look into his mind, and other books had granted him detailed information on the famous bank.

Thinking of the Knockturn end of the alley he remembered that he's have to stay on rooftops, the old-fashioned way, when he went back to London. He didn't want to intrude too much on the man's time was what he'd told him but secretly he had no idea how long he could bear to be in another person's immediate company, under house-arrest. Nothing personal to the man himself. And he'd made reservations at the place he'd stayed in summer before he realised he'd told Dumbledore he'd be staying in an inn… with the man's influence and 'wisdom' he'd blatantly be able to find him very easily if he did.

He put his knife and fork down, staring at the bewitched ceiling of the Great Hall as he rose.

_Not long at all._

He didn't care enough to notice Malfoy, on the other side of the room, staring venomously at his back.

* * *

The rest of his last day- Thursday 12th December- was taken up by a single lesson of Transfiguration and a double of Herbology. Harry couldn't imagine an easier end to the term. 

He was still top of Transfiguration, much to Hermione's dismay, successfully turning his wood into paper and back again after just a few minutes of McGonagall's demonstration. Hermione had only managed the first half of the transformation and her favourite teacher, McGonagall, had put it down to her recovering fingers.

As for Herbology- he still worked hard and Sprout had nothing against him, so he got along fine.

Perched on the roof on the last night of term, reading the second volume of Mädrigard's _Runic Engraving_ by moonlight, researching from basic instruction runes to animal versions and even so far as engraving the runic version of an ancient hero's name onto oneself, he stared South for a moment, stubbing out a cigarette on the stone tiles.

_With the research I could do into ancient figures of influence, the possibilities are endless- I could shadow a portion of old wizards' powers by carving their rune onto myself with some sort of their personal mark._

He considered, and snorted, thinking, _In a way, Voldemort already did that when he killed himself accidentally ten years ago… engraved a permanent rune onto my fucking forehead with his own wand. I wonder if I could get Dumbledore to do the same..?_

He grinned at the mental image of Dumbledore angry enough to fail at cursing him. How much of a push would it take? He lowered his eyes to the barely-illuminated book once more.

…_this is the basic principle of channelling a splinter of a person's spirit through runic and arithmantic magic. These are closely related with Blood Magic, the forgotten Arte de Sanguis, which can allow you to draw strength, energy and power from a particular person when they are near via a sample of their blood, a rune of their name on you and some sort of your personal effect upon them. However this is all I will say upon that particular matter. Some examples of Magical 'Heroes' include, obviously, Merlin, although his rune has long been lost, and…_

Harry looked up, thinking, _What the fuck? 'Blood magic'? And since when has this pretentious bastard of an author not gone into laborious detail over something obscure… why has he not explained more on this? 'Arte de Sanguis'… that sounds terribly inviting…_

On the subject of Dumbledore Harry began to imagine a situation where he - although it didn't sound very appetising when out-of-context - carved a 'Dumbledore' rune upon himself and had a sample of the Headmaster's blood. He would gain a little of the man's energy, strength and power every time he went near him…

_But it can't be that simple. I'll have to do more research into it when I get to London… there will be a book somewhere. 'Forgotten art' my arse._

His mental 'To-do' list was getting longer.

Yawning, he shut the book and began to head towards the doorway again, a glance at the moon telling him it was Friday 13th and the day the train would leave… in just a few hours he'd be returning to London.

_Time for a few hours of shut-eye before going… going Home?

* * *

_

_Finally_, he thought, settling into a compartment on his own, away from the endless fussing of every other student returning to their homes over Christmas. _Why can't you put your shit on the train and just get on? Why make such a row over it?_

His trunk was in his pocket. His gun was holstered under his cloak. His dagger was strapped to his ankle under the loose jeans he was wearing. His amulet was around his neck and the tattoo- currently on his chest- almost quivered with anticipation.

All of his books, powder, keys, clothes and vitals were each inside one of the trunk's 24 compartments. One of them contained a barely-diminished pile of gold from vault 1188.

_London, here I come_, he thought.

With a glance out of the window he closed the compartment door and pulled out his trunk. Opening it on a seat with the 3 – 2 – 1 – 4 combination, he reached into his expanding library and pulled out 'Cogitative Progression – Leglimency for the Apt', one of the _Obscuras_ books, and closed everything back up.

Just as he sat down, as though in parody of the first train ride, his compartment door opened and Hermione stood there. An older Gryffindor walked past behind her, deep in conversation with a girl following about the injustice of the Quidditch game there had been in November, and to avoid his feverously gesturing hands Hermione moved into the compartment. She closed the door behind her.

"Hello, Harry."

He looked at her blankly, before nodding at her.

"Are you going on Holiday for Christmas?" she asked as she sat down.

He bit down many of the things he'd have liked to say, instead opting to simply shake his head.

"No? Oh…"

He knew he was supposed to ask her where she was going. He couldn't actually care any less than he did, and he knew that if things went well at Gringotts he might never see her again.

_So what's the harm?_

"You?" he asked bluntly.

"Yes," she said, smiling, glad he'd asked. "I'm going back to see my parents and then we're going to France. I think you met my mum before? In Diagon Alley? Well, anyway, they're both dentists. They'll be so fascinated to hear all about Hogwarts!"

Harry vaguely noticed the train was moving. He was staring at his book, regretting opening his mouth.

"Of course… of course I won't tell them _some _things, obviously."

…_and it has been said that if the Body is a man's temple then the Mind is the God he prays to, but I personally believe that the Man represents a more primal, Militant entity, for example; 'The Body is the Army as the Mind is a Fortress', and so on…_

He flicked past the introduction.

"I've wanted to say for – for quite a while now. Just that I'm sorry – sorry about telling the teachers you were fighting with that boy. It was silly, really," she laughed nervously. "My father does muggle karate- I should have recognised it."

_Stop talking, for fuck's sake,_ he thought amid a mental conversation with his raven.

When Harry didn't say anything she took a deep breath and said, "You – you remember on Halloween, Harry?"

His eyes flicked up.

"What?"

She stared at him for a moment, eyes wide at the sudden attention, before saying, "I don't suppose you heard anything, if you were at the feast, except that there was a - a troll inside the castle."

He looked back at his book, saying, "I heard there was, yeah. Between that and the whole teacher-window incident, it makes you wonder about the security of the place."

"Oh – oh, no, Harry- Hogwarts is one of the safest places in the country…"

"And I'm sure that under capable hands it would be a fine institution."

There was a moment of silence. Harry's eyes moved across the page quickly while he conferred with Mar about the raven's arrangements over the Christmas.

"You're… you're not coming back, are you? In the new year?"

"What gives you that idea?" he asked slowly, careful not to react.

"I just - you seem like you're leaving. I saw you staring at the castle before we got in the carriages…"

"Don't," Harry said, still looking at the same word on the page, "Don't you have – I don't know, _friends…_ or something? To go and sit with?"

There was no speaking for a while after that, until finally Harry looked up with a frustrated sigh to see Hermione staring resolutely at her folded hands in her lap.

"Well?" he asked.

"The reason I wasn't in the – in the Great Hall, on Halloween… was because Ron and some of the others were mean about me earlier in the day. And I heard them. They said I didn't – that I didn't have any friends, and they were right, Harry. I know you don't like me, but-"

"Oh, for fuck's sake," Harry said loudly, slamming his book closed and making her jump, staring at him in horror. "What the fuck actually happens in that head of yours? What's the point in having a brain so fucking big if you're skin's too thin to hold it all in?"

She stood up, looking like she was on the verge of tears, saying, "I have to-"

"No, damn it, Hermione! That's exactly what I'm talking about! Sit down!"

She went for the door and Harry locked it with a wave of his hand.

She spun to face him, staring, a mixture of confused emotions in her wide eyes.

"Sit the fuck down, Hermione. _Now_. I want to say something to you that you really need to hear."

She complied, sitting by the door, slowly, still staring at him.

"Seriously, _listen._ Now, I'll try not to rant," he said, reigning in his irritation until it merely simmered. "But you need to do some growing up. Soon. When you've seen _half_ of the shit I have - when you've lived in the gutter and been treated like vermin by everyone you meet for _four years_ – then you can cry to me about how you don't have any friends, and how nobody likes you, and how hard everything is."

It was snowing outside.

Harry held up his fingers, saying, "When you've come _this_ close to being murdered by some cheap, ratty cunt who simply wants to _have some fun_ while he's bored, been stuffed into a boot and left for dead, been cursed by strangers and when you've let yourself get close to only a few fucking people only to have them _die_ on you, _then_ you can get upset."

He spread his arms, stopping himself before he went too far, saying, "Why do you look so upset now? What is it I've said that's affected you like that, eh? Rationally? Am I not making sense at all? You – you just need to start putting things into context. Think about things in a real life situation- you're fucking smart, for Christ's sake, use your head more. Stop thinking so academically. In that bathroom with the troll I could think of about forty spells you could have used against it, and you're more than capable to have, but you haven't learnt them because it's 'school' - _that_ and everything else I've seen at that fucking place is enough for me to have _stopped _treating it like an institution, whereas _you_ haven't learnt how to defend yourself because it was 'obviously a one-off'. It wasn't! It obviously wasn't, it's happened to you now as well as me and as well as loads of other so-called students, because Dumbledore does not hold his reigns as tight as you think.

"The difference," he continued, quieter, "is that I don't believe in that bollocks- there _are_ no one-offs. It _will_ happen again, as you'll see in the rest of the year. That's the difference- that from the first thing that happened to me, in a dentist's office fucking _years_ ago, I decided to take control and stop shit happening. Or, at least, be ready for it when it does. But instead of _thickening your own skin_ or anything, one thing happens, 'oh shit that's terrible, well, let's go back to daily life' is your reaction, instead of learning _new things_ to counter all this crap."

He sat down. He didn't realise he'd got up. She wasn't looking at him. He stared at the grey skies outside the train for a moment.

"It doesn't matter what the fuck people say about you- the whole thing is you have to earn people's respect and you do that by acting maturely- not in a know-it-all way but in a calm, simple, 'I don't give a shit' way- and dealing with things as they come, and learning from the shit that happens. Fuck everyone who calls you names or upsets you- including me. Forget about them- they aren't worth shit. Rise above them. If someone offends you badly, you fuck them over… in your way that might be grassing someone up, or duelling them or something. I don't know."

He let it sink in. He was tired of talking- he picked up his book from the floor and unlocked the door with a wave of his hand.

"It was you in the bathroom, wasn't it?" she asked, but before Harry could respond the door opened abruptly.

The trolley lady peered in, looking concerned.

"Is everything alright, my dears? I heard a raised voice…"

"Yes, we're both fine and no, we don't want anything. Thank you," Harry said, regretting not silencing the door too. _How many fucking people heard that?_

Hermione stood up with a small, distracted smile at the trolley-lady, who smiled back in a worried way and moved along the corridor.

Before Hermione could leave, however, Harry saw a sequence of people he _really_ didn't want to see.

Ali Sumesqi walked slowly past the door, smiling his feral grin at Harry, teeth bared. Harry's hand reached for his gun but before he could pull it out the boy had passed on… _as though I'm supposed to believe you were just passing?_

Next in line were Malfoy and his surviving goon. Harry rolled his eyes and took his hand off the gun.

"Potter," Malfoy said, being less wise than Ali was and marching in. Hermione sat down under his glare. "And the Mudblood. How sweet… trouble in paradise?"

"If you're blunt senses can't even detect that this is _really_ bad timing on your part, kid, then there's no hope for you at all," Harry said, meeting his eyes.

"I've got something for you," Malfoy said, grinning like an idiot. "Merry Christmas!"

With that parting line he dropped something into Harry's lap and darted out, slamming the train door.

Harry held it up with a snort- it was a bag of Dungbombs and the smell was starting to spread.

_I'll kill him because he insults me,_ he repeated in his head. _That's about it.

* * *

_

Hermione was completely pale and ashen-faced, and she stumbled out of the compartment with a few glass cuts in her exposed skin, her arms outstretched and her eyes wide and horrified.

A few people ran towards the door- the sight of a student covered in blood confirmed some fears they'd had when they'd heard the almighty crash that had resounded from the compartment after the shouting.

Malfoy and his companion weren't laughing. They stared in horror, wondering what was happening.

The trolley lady put her wand in the air and shot a silver thread of thought at the driver, before bustling over to Hermione with cries of woe and attempts at comfort.

A fourth year in the next one along peered into where Hermione had come out from- it was completely clear except for shards of glass covering the floor and seats and the wind roaring in through the huge smashed hole in the window.

The whispers started up along the train- they varied in detail and fact.

Malfoy was wondering where in the name of Merlin Harry Potter went- they were ordinary Dungbombs, he'd been sure.

"What happened dear? What on earth happened?" the trolley lady repeatedly asked the shocked Hermione, who merely shook her head.

A few compartments along, Ali Sumesqi sat back, alone, smiling to himself.

* * *

Harry opened his eyes and the world was grey. His entire body was freezing cold. 

He became conscious of the fact that he was covered in blood, lying in the snow, in a lot of pain and staring at the grey sky… whereas a few seconds ago he'd been on the train back to London.

He raised his head and saw, standing by his feet, a very tall blonde man in billowing robes.

He grinned and Harry saw a flash of fang.

"You smell delicious," the man said, licking his lips.


	21. The Return, Pt II

_Thank you for the reviews, everyone. Have a good Christmas. Please enjoy. G.L_

* * *

Harry's instincts kicked in and he forced himself to move. His left arm had become tangled in his robe, he realised as he stood slowly up. 

His senses were in overdrive but there was a haze over his vision, and a dull, throbbing confusion and uncertainty clouded his immediate consciousness.

The man just stood there while Harry straightened himself out, smiling serenely, and Harry fought to remember what had happened.

_I moved to the window, to throw the Dungbombs out,_ he recalled. _I dropped them out of the window… then there was a flash of black. Hermione was speaking while I tried to see what it was. Then there was… that face…_ he stared at the man in front of him. The tall, cold blonde man who was smiling. _His face. Right outside the window. The glass exploded, then I was… then I was here._

He slipped awkwardly into his centre when he felt the pain begin to kick in, and he knew he was bleeding.

He turned his head slightly and saw the Hogwarts Express round a hill in the distance, the smoke from the engine lingering in the sky, meshing with the grey cloudline.

"You're 'Shujin', is that correct?" the man said, his voice crossing the distance despite it being a whisper.

"I'm… I'm developing a healthy dislike for windows," Harry replied, frowning, wondering why- even in his centre- his senses were buzzing in such a disconcerting way. Everything in his vision had a soft, blurred edge.

The man was still smiling. He raised his arms.

"You are a frighteningly disappointing mark, young Shujin. Not that anybody has ever impressed me, that is, but still… for the pay I'm receiving…"

_Let's gather what I know,_ Harry thought, staring at him. _He might be a vampire. In fact, with those teeth, he probably is. Which would explain the buzzing in my ears… previous victims have written of it… ok. So as far as that goes, I'm in trouble. He talked about being paid… he's been hired to kill me. He's taller than average, slight of build, breathing calmly, and in no rush. Good. I need to get my head straight._

He reached around for his gun… despite his tangled state and the tumble he'd taken, it was holstered. He pulled it out.

"A firearm, Shujin," the man stated, surprised. "Ah… so the plot thickens. Indeed. This will be interesting."

Harry shot him in the face. It cracked again in echoes over the hills.

The figure dropped like a stone and Harry stood, swaying, in the freezing wind, the blood on him drying slowly, his gun trained on the figure.

The blonde man stood up, slowly, frowning for the first time. He had a red dot on his cheek where the bullet had entered.

_So he's a vampire,_ Harry decided, sighing. _Shit. The bullet will about now be dissolving in his blood. That wound will heal in just under an hour. The lead in these rounds won't do shit all against him._

"Contrary to popular belief," the man said slowly, "that actually hurts quite a lot."

Harry squeezed off another round but by then it was too late… the vampire was upon him. He was taken off his feet by what felt like the Hogwarts Express being driven into his chest and he flew, meeting the cold, hard ground by the train tracks in a crumpled heap.

"_Fuck_," he groaned after landing, unable to breathe properly.

He'd also let go of the gun… now he couldn't even slow the man down.

Suddenly the buzzing in his head grew until it pressed against the backs of his eyes and he gasped in pain, feeling the strange presence grow in his mind. His vision was almost completely white, and small electric charges ran down his spine.

He wasn't aware of himself crying out again.

'_Stand up._'

The voice echoed over the racket- he could hear it in his ear. It wasn't shouted but it was _loud._ He tried to put his hands over his ears, over his eyes, but instead he absently felt his whole body move.

_Find my centre… find my fucking centre…_

He knew he'd done as the voice instructed. He'd stood.

_Jesus fucking Christ, fucking get me out of this, _he thought furiously, terrified. He had no defence, no experience… nothing against a vampire.

'_Come to me_', the voice cut like a hot knife through the clamour in his mind… he couldn't disobey.

Harry almost screamed with shame as he felt himself comply.

Then, abruptly, the buzzing and the searing pain and the throbbing _presence_ in his head was pushed aside… his mind, under duress, had _forced_ itself into its centre.

For a moment, everything was calm. Harry's blurred vision showed him he'd stopped walking about twenty paces from the man. The sky moved slowly extremely slowly, the fast, biting wind was a tickle against his numb, distant shell. The presence in his head fought for control and white flashes of lightning shot upwards across his vision, burning his eyes.

'_Come to me,_' the voice said again, but it was quieter this time, less imposing, and almost strained.

'_Fuck you,_' Harry sent back, responding in the same way he did to Mar.

_You're OK, for the moment, Shujin,_ Harry told himself, making his body breathe deeply. _You're unharmed. Your mind is mostly your own. Find a way to kill this cunt. Concentrate._

But Harry knew, somewhere in his warped and struggling psyche, that this was not a fight he could win. He may have some control over his head, now, but he was completely outmatched in body.

He'd have to use his Art.

The vampire, a distant presence in Harry's immediate consciousness, suddenly broke the strange mind-charm he'd been using as a wall of snow hit him- hard- from behind.

He didn't even flinch, but it surprised him.

He grinned at Harry, whose almost-totally white eyes didn't even seem to be looking at him, and before the vampire knew it this kill had become a bit more interesting.

From all around him Harry orchestrated swamps and waves of packed snow to sweep over the vampire. He was aware of the figure laughing, but it was something at least while he began to unlock his Art, letting some angry emotion slip into his centre in spikes that physically manifested itself in the rock-and-snow masses that threw themselves over the blonde man.

_Keep laughing, you bastard,_ Harry thought.

Suddenly the vampire was moving- it was actually too fast for his normal eyes to see, a flash of black robe and light hair that kicked up a trail of snow seconds after it'd travelled over it, but in his centre things moved slower.

Much slower… the figure was still blurred, but was moving at the speed of a normal human running.

Running at Harry.

He moved to the side, at the same speed, and the figure changed direction to match. Harry didn't have long. A chunk of blinding rage grew from a crack in his mental walls and he raised his arms.

If someone had been watching the impact they'd have seen two blurs meet in a flash of bright colour and propel away from each other just as quickly, a plume of dry snow- like still water when a pebble is dropped into it- rising in their wake.

Harry landed on his rear but the vampire stayed on its feet and began moving again.

Harry closed his eyes.

In a tremendous crack he slipped away from what was happening, a storm of oppressive black squeezing in on his being, before he appeared in the middle of a deserted, sunny country road.

He didn't know where he was. He didn't care. He collapsed to his knees, feeling the bruises and cuts from the train window and- more severely- the broken arms and dented skull from the impact between him and the vampire.

They began to heal, Harry speeding it up in his centre, anxious to be better once more.

After a time… how long he didn't know… he gasped lungfuls of air and stood, healed once more, completely submerged in the rush of his Art and power, eager to be back in the fight.

_It's been a long time since I've been like this,_ he thought mildly. _And this is probably the most- apart from that time in that wizard's flat- I've ever used my Art._

Feeling something digging into his chest, he put his hand in the gaps between the buttons on his shirt and pulled out his amulet… smashed. Barely in one piece.

In a blur he pulled his trunk from his pocket. It was a little creased where it had been squashed, but was perfectly operational.

He opened one compartment without thinking about it, flinging the broken trinket in and pulling from his apothecary two pepper-up potions and a Clarity Draught. While downing them, he opened his trunk at another combination and pulled out his Katana.

The legacy of Mito Nobunaga…

He quickly checked the blade. He was working extremely fast. Then he took off his robe and bundled it into the same compartment before slamming, shrinking and stuffing-away his trunk into his jeans pocket.

He closed his eyes, slipping into oblivion once more.

The road was empty no more than thirty seconds after it had been filled. The lane lay quiet.

* * *

Bernard, the driver of the train, was unaware of any commotion at all. He had his eyes on the tracks ahead in the dark, snowy Scottish highlands and his wand trained on the spade that was shovelling coal into the brazier all by itself. 

He was wrapped up in his thickest, most enchanted cloak but was feeling the bite of the wind on his cheeks anyway.

He was humming to himself tunelessly, eyes narrowed, as he had been from Hogsmeade station and he would be until he was out of the snow.

Suddenly there was a green flash on his controls, reflected from the fire. He jumped out of his skin in surprise as the fire exploded outwards, the shovel catapulting away, and in a green blaze of glory Albus Dumbledore stepped out.

"Bernard," the elderly man said quickly. The driver automatically recognised him and, despite his shock, sketched a bow. The Headmaster continued, "Keep the train moving. Miriam just buzzed me- apparently there's been an accident. _Under_ _no circumstances will you stop this train._"

And then the Headmaster was gone, despite it being the first time he'd seen the old man since he'd been approached for the job. A flash of navy-blue robes as they disappeared into the dark doorway, and he was alone once more, thoroughly confused.

* * *

Dumbledore made his brisk way down the train, casting a _sonorous_ on his voice that allowed him to speak to everyone on it, instructing them to stay inside their compartments, close their windows and not move a muscle. 

A few heads peeking out of carriages and compartments shot straight back in as he walked past, eyes fearful towards him, and he ignored them.

Eventually he came to a carriage where a sickly smell lingered, and Dumbledore recognised it to be that of Dungbombs… a Zonko's product. One of the nemeses of his caretaker.

Miriam, the woman who ran the trolley, could be heard consoling someone with a shaky voice, and Dumbledore could see her trolley where it had rolled down the train to the end of that carriage after she'd left it.

He also felt a strange draft.

He entered the compartment and said, in a soft voice "My goodness… Miss Granger, what in the name of Merlin happened?"

His eyes danced over the broken window before meeting the young girl's.

He used a brief scan of leglimency to discern, over her shaking voice, what had happened.

He stood in silence for just a second while she was talking, and Miriam was talking, before asking them the most important thing.

"How long ago?"

"About four, maybe five minutes ago," Miriam said, her arm around Hermione.

Without a second's more deliberation he disapparated with a pop. The scene he entered, when the sensation of being squeezed through a rubber tube was over, was something that burned itself into his memory forever.

Everything was a blur just a little way further down the tracks. He'd misjudged the distance very slightly in his haste, but he could see almost exactly what was happening and, to say the least, he was very surprised.

What he'd expected to see, he realised, was Harry Potter's bloody corpse and maybe- if he was lucky- a gloating killer. He'd expected to have to hunt for either Harry's body or traces of portkey residue. Traces of blood on the snow.

Blood on the snow was something that wasn't lacking, but the scene that met his eyes as he ran closer was something that ranged far beyond unexpected.

Two blurred, flashing figures darted around, backwards and forwards, screams of exertion and pain meeting his ears, and despite Dumbledore having his wand out he didn't raise it. Not only did he not know who was who, he was too surprised to react.

The scene above the two was almost literally a fireworks display, ranging from natural grey clouds to black flashes to coloured flames to explosions and puffs, all in sharp blinks, quickly succeeding each other. Coloured blades of light span every direction away from the two figures.

When he watched this scene in his pensieve he'd see Harry with a wand in one hand and a large sword in the other fighting an unknown assailant with a wand and long, deadly-looking claws.

It was a picture that didn't even range from the farthest, most unfathomable reaches of his imagination.

Explosions on the ground, of powdery snow, Earth and magical fire, covered most of the blurred movement from Dumbledore's vision. One moment the two figures were fighting furiously on the train-tracks, the next in deep snow, the next suspended for just a moment in the air.

The he saw Harry, and knew from the combat and from gut instinct that, a long time ago, he'd met him in Mundungus Fletcher's muggle property in London.

He'd been beaten by him. _He_ was the mystery wandless magician.

And now Harry Potter _had_ a wand, and he was apparently using it to great effect.

Dumbledore trod on something. He looked down and saw a shiny, smooth metallic object in the snow. His mind was blank. He looked up again and finally found his voice.

He pointed his wand at the moving figures, but before he could decide what spell to use to incapacitate the two, to gain control over the situation, he saw Potter fly backwards and land in a heap on the ground, his sword spinning away. Dumbledore didn't see a wand.

Then the boy was back on his feet again, clearly injured, eyes back on the blonde figure moving at him once more.

"Harry!" Dumbledore shouted in despair, and immediately regretted it.

The boy looked up at the Headmaster just as the fast-moving assailant tackled him.

Together they flew backwards onto a patch of flat white… and disappeared.

* * *

Harry's whole body burned; despite him being in his centre he felt every inch of it. He felt the hands around his neck. His eyes stung horribly as he looked upwards at the darkening ice above him… he was descending. He tried not to inhale. 

His body felt like it was being crushed with hot, blunt knives.

In a strange, quiet moment, away from the chaos of the fight above-ground- in a second of detachment from the leering figure who was following him down, clinging onto his neck- he remembered stepping into a sea of blackness.

Submerging himself bit by bit to escape the black, brickwork earth of a foreign world. The cold, confining clouds.

Dying.

Peace.

_No…_

_Yes, Potter._

He fought himself.

_No, Shujin!_

_Yes, Harry,_ his mind whispered. _Fuck it all. Peace._

_No, Shujin, I'm not just going to die. I'm not just you anymore._

He struggled, his body cramping, his life fading.

_I'm Harry fucking Potter now too, and I'll fucking live._

He cried out in bubbles, tears mixing with the water around him.

Inaudibly he screamed '_No! This isn't Shujin! Why am I so fucking weak? Why am I dying? I am Harry Potter! I AM SHUJIN!'_

There was a moment of crushing blackness.

Somehow he sensed the vampire with its hands around his throat begin pulling him closer as they sank under their heavy, waterlogged clothes. He sensed teeth nearing his neck as the world pressed him from every side.

_You can't drink my blood if I'm dead, can you? _He whispered in his mind. _Decision made._

He inhaled…

…it was Heaven and Hell in a single breath. The relief of following his instinct, and the pure and utter _pain_ that filled his insides. Cold fire and hot ice.

He felt his body being grabbed by something, like he was a tiny fish that had been hooked on a line and was ascending to its fate.

Hands. A face. Inky blackness rushing past him…

_Too late. The afterlife is taking me, for good this time. I'm fucked.

* * *

_

Harry's body exploded from the surface of the water after a moment and Dumbledore levitated his unconscious form before it hit the ruined ground, putting it down on his pre-charmed, cushioned area.

He cast heating charms on Harry before enervating him.

A fountain choke of freezing water burst from his mouth and he made a chilling retching sound, and Dumbledore quickly waved his wand over his mouth, vanishing the water in his throat.

Harry's eyes were wide and his chest was heaving. Combined with his injuries it looked as though, Dumbledore thought, he'd woken the dead.

Surprisingly quickly Harry sat up, not putting weight on an injured arm but spinning to face the ice-lake from the bank. He could see, about twenty feet out, where they'd entered. Dumbledore looked too.

The water, lapping over the lips of the cracked ice, was mostly still.

Harry was breathing slowly and laboriously, eyes still wide, staring around him at absolutely everything. He got up and staggered towards the train-tracks. Dumbledore let him go, still looking at the hole in the ice.

With eyes nearly as cold as the surrounding area, he raised his wand again, wordlessly freezing the lake over and casting an unbreakable charm on it that wouldn't wear off until the ice melted… in four months.

He went to find Harry; his face was like a stern deity's etched into marble.

* * *

"I cannot condone it." 

Harry sighed, rubbing some colour back into his face before replying.

"After what you saw, sir, I think you can understand why I'd need them. After all, I'm _not allowed_ to use magic when I'm back in London."

"But these are perfectly legal?" Dumbledore asked rhetorically, incredulously, holding up the sword in one hand and the gun in the other.

"No, but I don't care about non-magical law. I _want_ to be at this school," he lied smoothly. "I'd like to survive a holiday without being killed, expelled or locked away."

"You _want_ to be here, do you, Harry? Because if that is so, you obviously have accommodation here for the holidays…"

"I want to go home, sir," Harry said. It was completely true. "I want to be at this school but I want to be at home for the holidays."

They sat in silence for a while, Harry drinking a cup of tea he'd conjured himself. He was nearly totally healed but his magical reserves were quite significantly depleted after the day's events… it would be a few nights before he felt normal again. He'd done things that day he didn't know he could.

Dumbledore plainly wanted to drill him with questions about everything but hadn't had the chance- he'd gone straight to teacher-mode above all else, asking him about the weapons. He now had an inkling of just how powerful Harry was, when he chose to unlock it.

The Headmaster decided to move on though, putting the weapons on the desk between them.

"Tell me again what happened after you got on the train, Harry," he asked wearily.

Harry sighed, but said, "I sat with Hermione, we talked for a while, I gave her some advice on her confidence issues, the trolley lady came by, she went on, another student walked past and then Malfoy came in. He dropped Dungbombs on my lap. I went to throw them out of the window, succeeded, and then saw… saw _him._ His face, by the window, upside-down like he was on top of it. The window exploded. I landed in the snow and those _weapons_ you '_don't condone'_ saved my life."

He'd decided from the portkey back to just be completely honest. If there was a time for Dumbledore to know about him, this was it.

Well, maybe not _completely_ honest. He was still going to rob the old bastard blind.

"And 'him', Harry? Describe this man again."

The boy scowled.

"I have - twice."

"Yes, but I'm hoping that you'll mention a detail that will prove that it isn't the man I think it is."

Harry's eyes narrowed. His emotionless mask was not even being attempted after the day he'd had.

"Are you going to tell me who you think it was?"

Dumbledore just looked at him over his steepled fingers.

"_Fuck's sake_," Harry hissed and Dumbledore's eyebrows rose. "He's just tried to _kill_ me and you won't even tell me who he is? Unbelievable. Fine, though- fine. I'm going to London, and I'll find out myself."

"You don't think he's dead then Harry?"

Harry ignored him. He stood as the flames in Dumbledore's office fire went green. Madam Pomfrey's head appeared there and she spared Harry a wary glance before talking to Dumbledore.

"Headmaster," she said. "Ms. Granger is being treated for severe shock. Her superficial wounds have been healed and the glass removed, but whatever Potter did to her, it's obviously warped her psyche someh-"

"Poppy," Dumbledore said sternly, looking at her over the rim of his spectacles. "That's quite enough, thank you."

"Yes, well," the nurse replied stubbornly. "She'll be awake in half an hour."

Her head disappeared.

After a few minutes Dumbledore looked at Harry, saying, "Do you think you should visit Hermione?"

"I doubt I'm on her list of people to see."

"Very well," Dumbledore said, rubbing his temples slowly. "Could you please answer some more questions?"

Harry groaned in frustration, saying, "Headmaster, what more can I say?"

"What about 'thank you'?"

Harry was thrown for a second.

"Well," he said, thinking, "am I thanking you for distracting me, giving that assassin the opportunity he needed to nearly drown me? Or for making me take the train in the first place, despite it being an obvious target?"

Dumbledore looked at him sadly.

"I meant for letting you keep the weapons, Harry," he said quietly. "On the condition that they are never brought out in my school again… and that includes the dagger strapped to your ankle. _Ever._"

"Thank you, then," Harry said, without missing a beat. He stepped to the desk and picked up his sword and gun, strapping them to him accordingly.

"Now, Harry, please?" Dumbledore asked, gesturing to the chair Harry had been occupying before.

"Well, if you're walking to the Hospital Wing, I won't object to accompanying you there," Harry said diplomatically, his face finally being trained deliberately. Dumbledore would be wincing as he recognised Harry sink into indifference.

In accordance, they left the office and walked for a short time in silence, before Dumbledore finally asked, "Tell me about Mr. Malfoy's Dungbombs."

Harry laughed quietly, saying, "So it _was_ a Malfoy."

"Hmm?"

"I should have known right away it was a Malfoy. Not Draco's dad, I assume? Being a vampire? No, probably not… but I know them by now. Same arrogance, same posture and smile. You remember the one I shot in that flat in London."

"Yes, Harry," Dumbledore said quietly. "I do remember."

"Do they all have that same hair? How horrible for them. Looking exactly like each other… that sneer, that authority…"

"You're doing a very good impression of them," Dumbledore chided gently, clearly feeling beyond his depth.

Harry laughed again, shaking his head.

"Well… I believe, if you insist on knowing, that it was Saevus Malfoy who you encountered today," Dumbledore said after checking the corridor was clear.

"Alright… Draco's immediate relation? Is he intrinsic to this?"

"I don't believe so. As you no doubt have figured out, the body of the Malfoy clan are very proud of their heritage. Having a bastard brother- a half-blood, like yourself, Harry, would be extremely shameful for them. To have him then bitten by a vampire, too…"

"Brother of who? Draco's dad or granddad?"

"His father… but I don't think Draco's immediate family would be altogether involved in this, somehow… but there are rumours that have circulated about Saevus and certain … connections. That would also be very shameful to them. On the other hand, congratulations, Harry- you survived an attack from one of the most wanted men in the world."

There was silence. They'd reached the right floor.

"I can't tell you more without you telling me about your time in London, Harry… Saevus Malfoy targeting you doesn't make a huge amount of sense."

"Yes, actually, it does. Let me let you in on something… just to nudge your memory, Professor. But, remember that I'm having a moment of _honesty_ here, for when I ask you something in the future. Wasn't that our original agreement?"

Dumbledore nodded gravely, listening intently.

"Who else was in the room the first time we met?"

Before waiting for an answer or answering himself, Harry turned on his heel and strode away. He entered a dusty classroom, ignored Peeves as he tried to taunt him, threw some powder he'd got from his trunk at the fireplace and floo'd to the Twilight Tavern in Knockturn Alley.

Come Hell, High Water or heinous _fucking_ villains, he was getting home that day.

* * *

Dumbledore collapsed back in his chair, feeling entirely worn out. 

_What a day_, he thought blandly.

He'd just watched the memory of Harry's fight. He'd been ashamed of his own reaction.

Most of the light show had been Harry's wandwork, but a lot of the things he'd done had been spells Dumbledore didn't recognise- they were like traditional combat spells, but with strange, amateurish-yet-effective twists. Clear flames, for instance, that a flame-freezing charm had no effect on. Curses with different colours so that the enemy had no idea what to shield themselves from.

_I can't help feeling that this is completely out of my hands_, he thought. _I feel like I didn't make the right decisions… but it's as though those decisions weren't mine to make._

With some training, he knew Harry would end up as a more-than-competent wizard.

_He'll be a very dangerous person, _Dumbledore considered. _Should I have let him go back to London? Knowing how dangerous it is for him now? Could I have even stopped him, short of locking him in the dungeons?_

Harry's parting comment played on his mind a little and Dumbledore recognised the reference to the Marksmen… which would be why Saevus was after him.

He rubbed his eyes, flinging his spectacles onto the desk, knowing he would have to watch the memory of Mundungus' death and the ensuing fight in his flat once more.

Professor McGonagall had apparated to the train to collect Hermione, who was in the Hospital wing and was responsive if not a little quiet. The Deputy Headmistress had also collected Mr. Malfoy, who Dumbledore would be seeing afterwards.

His mind was jumbled and he tried to organise it properly, before sticking his wand tip into the pensieve once more.

_I'm losing my grip_, he thought as he tumbled into the past.

* * *

The station was abuzz with activity, as it always was, but there was something else hanging over everything. 

_As well it should,_ Ali Sumesqi thought, satisfied.

The rumours had spread up and down the train that Harry Potter had disappeared. Malfoy was the prime suspect, the opinion enforced by McGonagall taking him with her when she'd apparated onto the train for Hermione.

The steam from the engine pumped over the crowds of concerned and excitable children and their calm, frowning parents. The voices of chatter died away when Ali stepped through the barrier leading into King's Cross.

He was wearing one of his best suits, in the same cut as the man who met him on the other side. But the difference between them was that the man, who nodded in silent greeting and took his trunk for him as Ali began walking to the exit, had a large, thick red ring tattooed around his eye.

Ali straightened his cuffs as he stepped out of the station, pleased to be away from the crowds, into the chilling grey evening.

He looked at the man, who dipped his head towards an unmarked black car sitting in the taxi ranks.

While the silent companion put the trunk in the back, the driver got out and opened one of the back doors for Ali to get in. He did so, sliding into the seat.

Facing him, sitting on the seats facing forwards, was a smartly dressed young woman with a leather-bound file in her lap. She wasn't looking at him.

He felt doors slam behind him- the silent man and the driver.

The car pulled away, and he kept his eyes trained respectfully on the back window, watching London's traffic.

Eventually, after a moment of daydreaming, Rebecca Hume's personal assistant coughed slightly to gain his attention.

"Guess what I'm going to say," she said in a low voice.

He considered, looking out of the window.

"He's alive?"

"Yes," she replied shortly.

"I told you- he has a knack for surviving, against the odds."

"Don't tell me anything… save it for Mrs. Hume."

She let it hang in the air.

Despite himself, Ali gulped slightly, closing his eyes against the darkening skies.

He was praying he'd survive this.


	22. The Messenger's Death

_I can't believe it either, but I'm back._

_Amidst my attempted relocation I lost my hard drive, which unfortunately had a shit load more on it than just fanfiction. I won't bother going into detail but I've been trying to write this up to the point I was at as well as everything else, and it hasn't worked- I don't have the time or the patience. When I knew it was gone I debated leaving it dead, but I looked at the reviews, pms, and hit counts and decided not to, so thanks to all who said anything encouraging to me about this- it was very overwhelming, and I'm hugely grateful. I'm sorry if it isn't up to standard- I was trying to remember what was in each chapter and I think I've squeezed 2 or even 3 into this one... it's a pain but short of changing the story altogether I don't know what I can do._

_I hope you're well, I apologise for the wait, and I'll see you as soon as I can. Cheers for sticking around., G.L._

* * *

_That face… those eyes, those fangs… leering – grinning._

_Grinning at me._

_I'm on my back – why am I on my back?_

_Those eyes…_

_Because I'm in bed. I'm under a blanket on Mike's sofa…_

_Those fangs…_

_He's grinning at me._

_Does he know I'm awake?_

_He's leaning down- don't think._

_Fuck._

_Sword._

With a grunt and a satisfying scream of metal flying from the sheath lying next to him, he slashed his blade through the air in a silver arc.

The tip made contact with flesh.

"_Aargh_, fuck! What the _fuck_ are you playing at?" a voice screamed.

Harry breathed, his chest contorting rapidly, staring into the blackness.

"Mike?" he asked the darkness, his voice hoarse.

"No!" the figure shouted, the accent unclear. "You little cunt, who the fu- you're just a little kid. A fucking little kid!"

He reached for Harry, who raised the sword, the blade catching some of the sparse moonlight entering the room through the window.

"Get – get the fuck back," Harry said, groaning, standing slowly and trying to sort his head out.

His magical battle earlier in the day had taken tremendous amounts out of him.

Keeping the blade between him and the stranger he moved towards the muggle light switch, but before he got there, there was movement behind him. He drew his gun rapidly, thanking Dumbledore in his head, but suddenly the voice rang out.

"Shujin? What's -"

"Mike?"

Everything was happening very quickly and light seared painfully across his vision as the switch was thrown and the hanging lamps snapped on.

Harry in a ready position, his Katana parallel to his straight back. Mike in his pink bathrobe with a hand on the light switch. And a small, hairless South African man with his teeth bared and a deep cut in his arm.

A beat passed, the stranger's eyes locked with Harry's.

"Chinky, tell this 'Shujin' kiddie that if he doesn't put that pretty sword down that I'll fuck his arse with it."

"Mike, tell this cunt that if he doesn't step back I'll beat him to death with his own leg."

He heard Mike grinning as he said, "Shujin, meet Taye. Taye- Shujin."

"And why," Taye began, almost spitting with rage, "is this clever little fucker wielding a sword around and sleeping on your sofa?"

"You're pretty early, Taye."

"You said come in the morning," the man said, his eyes still on Harry's.

"It's three in the fuckin' morning, ya twat," Mike insisted. "You're early."

"Who is this guy, Mike?" Harry asked, lowering the sword just a little as he stepped back.

"This is – ah, this is Taye, mate. An ol' friend. 'E's 'elping me out wiv some banking."

Harry finally looked at Mike and caught the man's raised eyebrows.

"Right," he said slowly, sheathing his sword, trying to calm himself. "And he's early."

"I'm still considering showing you how to use that sword, kiddie," Taye said, but despite the threat he was now completely relaxed. He either didn't feel he wound on his arm or he was ignoring it. "Mr. Stupid-pink-frock, who is this? Why isn't he dead yet?"

Harry was still holding the sheathed weapon and his eyes narrowed.

"This is Shujin, Taye. 'E's… he's replacin' me secretary in the shop. Apprentice tattooist, eh?"

"He looks about five years old."

"Looks can be deceiving," Harry said.

"Don't preach to the choir, brat," Taye said pleasantly. "Mike I don't have long, you've got the rim-wraiths watching your house, eh. You want to talk business or am I wasting time, brau?"

Mike sighed.

"Right now, mate? Can' ya wait a couple of hours?"

"You said morning. It's morning. It has been for three hours."

"I'll step out for a minute Mike," Harry said, his tone as pleasant as Taye's. He looked Mike dead in the eye and said, "I wouldn't want to _mar_ the atmosphere."

Mike's eyes widened slightly and he nodded, so Harry made his way towards the fireplace, surreptitiously checking that his Raven was on top of the dresser.

* * *

"So why are you here?" the man said.

Saevus looked up, coming back to earth briefly, tuning into his surroundings once more.

"Pardon?"

Lucius Malfoy huffed and repeated himself.

Saevus grinned distractedly, eyes scanning the room, taking in the dwindling fire and the irritable little comforts of such a stately home. He sipped his wine and took a breath.

"This is my home too, _brother_."

Lucius scowled at him and hissed, "Not since you got bitten and became a fugitive. You are not a Malfoy."

"I don't see how," Saevus said, teasing but lost in thought. "We share everything from blood to a bed."

"I ought to curse you off the planet," Lucius said, his wand snapping out in his temper. "How dare you."

"You won't curse me though, will you, Lucius? Because I'll kill you. And even if I let you win my colleagues would then kill you."

"_Muggles_!" Lucius hissed in revulsion. "Your filthy friends would kill me, hmm?"

"Yes," Saevus said, bored. "My colleagues."

"Your _colleagues_," Lucius said, coming dangerously close to actually spitting as his hair fell out of place and he went redder. "Your colleagues told me you would be in this house as sparingly as possible. You'd be out hunting for them. Why aren't you?"

"Because I wanted to spend some time with my family," Saevus said coldly, grinning malevolently at his blanching half-brother.

The truth was far from it, Saevus knew, but it was the sort of thought that would never see the light of day. Much like Saevus himself…

Once he'd apparated out of the ice he'd become conscious for only the second time in his career of what it felt like to _fail_. It was temporary and trivial, certainly, but it still bit like silver.

_He's still alive,_ he thought. _Somewhere in the capital, alive, unharmed and very, very lucky._

He didn't really know how to feel. He'd stepped backwards into neutral ground (or as neutral as a place came for a vampire) to plan his next stratagem.

_I'll kill him, certainly, but perhaps outright attack is a little foolish. The boy is a lot more… wily… than he looks. I didn't know he could apparate- something the marksmen forgot to tell me. He also carries a sword with silver inlays… it's not fatal but it's painful enough to irritate me. And a handgun. He's… full of surprises._

He grinned to himself and saw Lucius reign in a shudder.

_This might be fun._

* * *

The man sighed.

He wasn't at the office but apparently, no matter where he was, he couldn't escape business.

He was dicing quickly and expertly, eyes on the board, his hands moving in practised motions. Carrot. Cucumber. Leek. Each piece the same width to within a quarter of centimetre.

"Say it again," he said, his deep voice resonating through his kitchen, accent lilting.

A different voice began to talk, smoothly and silkily- his aide. His eyes closed for a moment. His hands were still moving.

"_Nyet_," he sniffed, reopening them. "I was not talking to you, as you well know."

A resounding swallow met his ears and a female breath was taken in.

"Uncle," it said. _Rebecca_. "He has – has insulted our family. Our entire legacy."

He stopped dicing and met her eyes very quickly.

"You would lecture me on my own legacy?"

She was so taken aback she cut herself off mid-sentence. Her eyes dropped.

"Look at me," he whispered, frowning. "Rebecca. Look at me when you talk to me."

She did. A tear ran down her cheek and he gave a small _tsk _in indignation, gesturing with his knife. She didn't wipe it away – she didn't seem to think she could move.

"You are so young," he said. He looked at the knife and realised he had stopped dicing. He resumed. "You are also stupid, like your father was. Your father was stupid, so he died," the man shrugged.

"Yes, Uncle," she whispered.

He shook his head, a small smile on his mouth.

"You do not do your best. Begin to. I dislike these conversations and I am not working now, no? So I don't want to talk." He met his niece's eye once more, briefly, before saying, "I do not need to say you have displeased. Like your father. You know. You also know not to from now."

"Yes sir," she said resolutely. He wasn't convinced. But he'd kill her if she continued and they both knew it.

A few seconds passed in near-silence; the only sounds made were the knife on the chopping block and a door hinge somewhere outside of the kitchen.

Holding up a piece of cucumber, he smiled.

"Every piece perfect. I feed children, too," he said. "Everyone leave me alone while I cook. Everyone."

He swallowed the piece whole – a little treat earned – and savoured the taste on his tongue. When he was alone he continued to cut.

* * *

Taye was back in muggle London. Harry had physically restrained himself from killing the man twice in the few days he'd been with them. Mike was out on his bike somewhere – he'd said, in what Harry hoped was a joke, that he was buying _Tattooing for Dummies_ and some artwork books for his 'new apprentice'.

Harry was leaving Gringotts, eyes taking in as much as possible of the foyer, after a meeting with Bite-Helm to let the little goblin know that all was still on track. Or rather to let him _think_ that all was still on track. The creature had been very interested in Harry's term at Hogwarts, listening to the brief rendition with a malevolent smile.

He stepped into the freezing winds in the bleak, dark winter of the country's capital and couldn't _wait_ to have his money and be gone from it all. He wasn't sure where he'd go – probably to somewhere in Europe, to a city not too abstract and not too detached from what he knew and was comfortable with. He'd buy a flat with a rooftop garden. He'd spend his nights with the stars. He'd most likely plot what action he'd do next… some way to influence muggles with magic? A position of power, somewhere? The possibilities were astounding.

He walked, in his own world, mind playing over plans again and again, and before he knew it he was brought back to the present in Knockturn Alley by a pair of footsteps behind him.

With an eerie sense of _déjà vu_ he tried to catch a glimpse of the person in the windows of shops, but it was never quite the right angle. He sped up and the footsteps did too. He slowed down with the same result.

_He's been following since Gringotts_, he somehow knew. _Maybe not,_ he reasoned,_ but he's sure as fuck following me now. Same bloke? Someone else?_

It didn't really matter, he told himself. Unless it was a certain vampire…

It continued towards the centre of the alley, Knockholt Square, but before they got there Harry felt for the reassuring weight of the sword at his hip and turned around casually, standing in the way of the tail.

Apart from the two of them the alley was empty.

There was a moment of uncertainty. Harry stared at him – a hooded stranger. _How cliché,_ he sighed.

"What?" Harry asked, impatient.

The stranger cocked his head.

"What he fuck do you want?" Harry said bluntly. "Who are you?"

The stranger lifted his head slightly and Harry saw the shadow of a grin.

_Fangs_…

_No,_ he admonished himself. _Not fangs, fuck it. Jesus Shujin, come on. Just some loony smiling._

The stranger lifted his hands and dropped the hood, still smiling sourly.

Harry almost laughed with relief. It was too good to be true.

"Potter," the man sneered when he saw Harry's relief.

"Wanker," Harry smiled, cheerfully, at his Potions Professor. "I thought it might be someone to worry about."

"Vermin," Snape spat. "Twenty points from Gryffindor."

Harry grinned wider, saying, "Let's make it an even hundred- wanker, wanker, wanker, wanker. Christ, Snape, I smelt that pig-grease sweating minutes before I heard you. You're oilier than most of the beggars in this alley."

"'Christ'?" Snape laughed nastily. "The Headmaster seems to think you need _protecting_, you spoilt brat, but of course, little _Harry Potter _is so _big and strong_ he can fend for himself."

"Wow," Harry said, matching the sarcasm. "You figured that out by yourself. Am I that easy to read?"

"Yes, and you're easy to follow, too," Snape smirked.

"Evidently not," Harry said frankly. "Why don't you fuck off back to school with your tail between your legs like a good little bitch, eh?"

He'd got that one off Taye.

Snape began a tirade against him, and suddenly Harry had a revelation.

_Jesus, what the fuck is going on? Four months ago I'd have killed him without a second thought – that was my plan, right? Him, Draco and Ali need to die. Instead, Shujin, you're standing here at his level, throwing petty insults._

There was a short pause of incredulity before Harry felt so physically ill he actually thought he would vomit.

_What the fuck is happening to me?_

Snape was still talking, and Harry held up a hand, brow creased.

"Shut up. Shut the fuck up, idiot. You -"

He paused. There was nothing really to say. He couldn't get away with killing him in the middle of the street, could he? _Why do I care!? I'm fucking Shujin, it's what I do!_

_But he isn't attacking me. And it's broad daylight, close to where I'm living. Dumbledore knows he's here._

_KILL HIM!_

Harry's eyelids flickered – he half-turned.

"Snape – you…" Harry wasn't sure what was happening. He was just talking anyway. "You have any idea about the sort of people following me? Any idea what they'll do to _you_ if you look like you know me? And you stand here and confront me in the middle of the street?"

His brain was completely blank. He wasn't sure what was happening.

'_Shujin?_' a voice in his head asked.

'_Yes, Mar_,' he answered. Snape was talking again.

'_Are you alright? You look distressed._'

'_No, I don't think I am quite right. I'm changing, I think, and it isn't good._' Harry's eyes finally found his Raven on a nearby gutter, thirty feet above his head. '_I'm not sure what to do._'

Finally, making up his mind somewhat, he simply turned away from the still-talking Snape and began to walk. He registered the volume rising behind him. He kept walking.

He wasn't sure where he was when he stopped, but he looked around to determine that Snape hadn't followed, and closed his eyes.

_Despair_, he decided. _That'll spike my art._

Pure, unmitigated despair poured through him and he felt absolutely helpless for a few moments as the world went black. Something pressed against his head until the vision cleared itself up and he stood, once more, in Mike's flat.

But something wasn't right.

_I can't believe this,_ Harry thought as he reigned in his emotions once more. _What now?_

It was fairly evident what was wrong, but the extent was not. Mike's front door was open. It wasn't foolproof in any way, but it was usually warded, which meant someone had actually _tried_ to get in and weren't put off by distractions.

Harry turned from the front door to face the intruder.

Sure enough, there in the main room of the flat, sitting on the sofa where Harry slept, was a man dressed in black with a solid red ring around his eye. He smiled at Harry.

"Mr. Potter, or Shujin… I bring a message from Rebecca Hume," the small man said.

That was as far as he got.

In retrospect, Harry realised he might not have been quite as zealous as he was if the man hadn't resembled Snape, from the large nose to the skin tone. However, at that time, Harry lost control completely for the first time in a long time.

Seeing white, the last thing he consciously registered was drawing his sword. From that moment on, he felt completely relaxed, in his hazy white existence, until he came-to.

There might have been music.

* * *

Mike was more worried by the smells issuing from the flat than he was by the open door. His arms full of bags he sighed and resigned himself to whatever might be inside with a set jaw, marching into his home stoically.

Harry sat on the floor with a mug in his hands. He was unscathed and not a fleck of blood was on him… apart from the pool he was sitting in. _That explains the coffee smell,_ Mike thought. However, strewn across the flat were what looked like wet red ribbons.

_I suppose that explains the coppery smell. But what about the..?_

His eyes found the once-man's intestines, shredded frantically, half-digested food and bile left in soggy lumps across the floor; sickly-coloured islands in a sea of scarlet.

_Ah._

"Mike," Shujin's young voice intoned. "I'm sorry."

Mike sniffed, frowning, before dropping his bags on one of the un-tainted areas of the table. His young comrade had… _decimated_… someone.

"Right," Mike said slowly. "Please tell me this weren't Taye."

"It was a Marksman."

_Even better,_ Mike thought sourly.

"Why?" he asked simply.

Shujin looked lost, shaking his head as he said, "I've – I've had a bad day, Mike."

"Right," Mike said again with a sigh, flinging one of the bags – from Taye's bookshop North of the river – at Shujin's lap. "Tattoo books. Ge' changed – we're goin' to dinner. It's Christmas fuckin' eve, Shujin, cheer the fuck up. I'm Chinese an' I'm even in a good mood. Shit."

He turned to leave for his room before stopping to consider.

"Christmas, right – me list has jus' gone up a new carpet."

* * *

_Wine?_

Harry stared at Mike. The tattooed, Chinese Londoner sat for a moment with a mouth full of Merlot.

"That," he began after swallowing, "was fuckin' disgusting."

"Come on, Mike," Harry smirked. "It's Christmas after all. Cheer up."

"Fuck off. 'Ow's the potato?"

"This is potato?" Harry asked, staring at the plate.

"That's good. Real classy, Shujin. We'll make a gangster outta you yet."

Harry stared at him blankly for a moment before answering.

"My only experience with gangsters has been them trying to butcher me, so forgive me if I don't exactly aspire to that sort of profession."

Mike winked, leaning forward, saying, "Pussy."

Harry sighed, wishing he could leave. The restaurant was one of Mike's elaborate jokes- a muggle eatery in the middle of London, right under the noses of the marksmen.

Harry didn't understand why. He hadn't bothered to ask- Mike was in a smug, self-assured mood and Harry wanted no part it in. It could be to force a meeting between them and the… what was it? Ah yes- 'rim-wraiths' was what Taye called them. It could be because they wouldn't expect it… but that wasn't Mike's style. And even he wasn't stupid enough to try to dodge them in a place where it was _impossible_ for them to miss them.

Possibilities rolled through Harry's head. In the end he stopped caring. He was armed, volatile and edgy. It was Christmas, after all.

'_How's it looking outside, Mar?_' he sent to his Raven.

Mar, circling the restaurant and locale around them, sent back a positive if slightly bored answer and Harry sympathised.

Mike was rambling on about something as the waiter handed the artist a dessert menu. The Chinese man's eyes darted up noncommittally at him, and then landed back on Harry. He opened the menu and froze.

Harry raised an eyebrow, looking at him as he closed the menu and glanced at the waiter once more.

Harry shook his head, uncaring, and stared at the occupants of the restaurant. There was the obligatory elderly couple, two young men on their own and well into their cups, several families… _very Christmas Eve._

Nobody looked entirely out of place. One man was dressed a little scruffily for the tone of the place but he was clearly keeping himself in the waiters' good graces by over-ordering. No less than four bottles of wine stood on the table before him, all different, and yet somehow he didn't seem all that drunk.

Before Harry could frown further, Mike cleared his throat.

"What?" Harry asked.

"You fancy a dessert?"

Harry looked down- sure enough, his plate had been taken without him even realising it.

"I didn't even fancy coming, Mike."

"You sure? Mate, just look at this…"

Harry stared at him as he handed over the menu. He took it slowly, opened it, and stared.

_Boy,_ the inscription began, on the menu's thick paper in the block red font they'd ordered their main courses from. _Perhaps we should talk, face to face? Consider this my white flag- after all, if I simply wanted to murder you (still) I could have done so, easily, with a time-turner an hour backwards behind your chair as you stared at the tramp in the corner. I've been watching you since you slipped through my fingers in Scotland. Just to sway your mind a little, imagine I know exactly what you're planning at Gringotts, commend it, and would like to talk a little business with regards to the Vampire hired to kill Boy scenario. If you would like to, then walk into the toilets and drop a spoon into the muggle hand-washer's tray. If not, don't. Either way, I'll see you on the way back to Mike's flat. Enjoy your meal._

Harry read it again quickly, then let out a tremendous sigh, drawing stares from nearby.

He met Mike's eyes.

"It was to be expected sooner o' later," Mike said slowly. "What're we gonna do?"

"I'm…" Harry said with his mouth half open. "I'll talk to you in a second."

"Where you goin'?" Mike said, sliding backwards on his chair as Harry stood.

"Toilet."

* * *

"…tickets bein' lost left 'n' right."

Rebecca Hume came back to herself in time to hear the last sentence. She had been meditating slightly, not quite entirely in her office in North Kensington, going over statistics in her head.

She stared blandly at the elderly man in front of her.

"What about the tickets?"

"The cozzers ain' buyin' it, Miss. They cottoned on, I fink- same first wiv scratchcards, now tha ticket side…"

"What exactly have they 'cottoned on' to?"

"The scam, Miss-"

"Scam?" she barked. "What scam, Mr. Gregory? You and your people… you're just exceptionally good salesmen. That's all."

"Yis, Miss."

She glared at him, saying, "You're not submitting the profits? No banks?"

"No, Miss."

"You've all got licenses?"

"Yis, Miss, bu-"

"Then there's nothing to worry about."

The man stood there, mouth gaping, clearly intent on saying something, so she held up a hand.

"Leave," she told him, and he did.

As he left, she stood, tutting to herself, before walking out of the office through a side door held for her by a young man and swinging her overcoat on.

Before she passed him she turned to him and he lowered his eyes.

"Henry, I want the folders for downsizing protocol on my desk tomorrow morning."

He nodded, knowing where they were kept, often having to fetch them for her.

She nodded too, and then walked on, in thought, down through the hallway towards a private elevator.

'Downsizing protocol' folders were a pale green, kept in bulk in a safe lower in the building, and included hundreds of copies of short-term contracts and a list of phone numbers, used on rotation or by availability. The contracts were used in bulk- they were forms with blank spaces for small-time runners on low-profile marks in Central L., under £1000 each, often handed out as 6 or 7 contracts in a single deal.

_Let those shit-eating, thieving tout bastards worry when a few of the flies on their pile drop dead,_ she thought, satisfied.

She got into the elevator and nodded to Oscar, who stared straight ahead and pressed the ground floor button, turning a key to activate it. Oscar was one of the few people in the building who didn't have any sort of ring around his eye, but for different reasons than Rebecca.

Dark Green folders had a different name and- despite Rebecca's efforts- rarely saw the light of day. Dark Green folders were known as 'Envelopes', because they were used to send a very clear message. Rebecca knew of only two in the game at that time- that was because they were the two she had put in that were unresolved. They would stay in rotation, up for grabs, until someone fulfilled the criteria.

The first was a very unwise gentleman from the other side of London, a place called Charlton, who had walked away from her branch of her uncle's organisation with not just a ring around his eye but £40,000 worth of uncut cocaine under his arm.

The second one, which she was in the difficult process of reeling _out_ of rotation, was for Harry 'Shujin' Potter.

She stepped onto a dark, wet Imperial College Road from her private hallway and a doorman lunged forward with an umbrella.

She ignored him, stepping forward towards where her car was waiting, and he trailed behind, trying to shield her from nonexistent rain.

Rebecca eyed his nametag as she got into the car and he closed the door after her hastily, actually _bowing_ at the window.

She sighed, but not because of the doorman- by that point she'd forgotten him. She sighed because someone was already in her car waiting for her. Ignoring him for a moment she made eye contact with the driver in the rear-view, signalling him to start the engine.

"Yes, Walden?" she asked, settling in, eyeing the ugly liaison's moustache and the grey robes he wore.

"The beast's off the wire."

She ignored his lack of respect in light of the revelation.

"Find him," she said shortly.

"Two men are on it, Miss. He's ignoring or genuinely avoiding us, though."

"Get out," she snapped. "Find him now."

He nodded and popped out- suddenly he was gone. Fortunately the driver was used to this sort of occurrence and consequently ignored it.

She rubbed her eyes, having known something like this would happen- unsuccessful hitmen often became obsessed with their marks.

But of course, they weren't _often _vampires…

She stifled a yawn, and was making the mistake of wondering what else could happen that Christmas Eve when the car phone rang.

"What?" she said into it.

"You need to get to the restaurant," an accented voice said.

She frowned, asking, "What restaurant?"

A pause.

"Your uncle's. Right now."

* * *

Harry stood at the entrance to the men's toilets, a spoon in his left hand, his gun in his right, in his coat pocket.

A huge mirror along one wall, above a line of sinks. There stood the tall, black 'muggle hand-washer', his tray on the side with a few small coins in it, a towel over one of his arms. Along the right side of the room was a metal urinal. You had to walk through an archway straight ahead to reach the cubicles.

"Easy boy," the attendant greeted with his eyes on Harry.

Harry looked around once more. The room was empty, apart from the two of them.

He dropped the spoon and it clattered across the wooden floor. The attendant's eyes followed it as Harry pulled his dagger from the back of his belt.

"Hey-" the man began, his eyes widening as Harry moved towards him.

His enchanted knife entered the man's chest, piercing the cartilage breastplate and the intercostal muscles and sliding between the ribs into the man's diaphragm.

Unable to make a sound, the attendant's eyes widened and his mouth gaped. His hands rose and grasped at Harry wildly, who ignored them. The towel fell to the floor.

Harry twisted the knife, further separating the ribs and tearing the muscle.

The man let out a sort of groan and slumped onto his knees. Harry's hand stayed on the hilt as it dropped lower, and he maintained the pressure on it.

"Where is he?" he growled into the man's face.

The attendant let out a pitiful half-groan, face contorting in pain, and breathed in short, sharp, painful gasps.

"Point," Harry instructed.

The man shook his head, tears running from his eyes, staring at Harry in disbelief and terror.

Harry removed the dagger from the man's chest, slowly, and watched the air rush back into the attendant's lungs. The man fell backwards against the sink counter in agony, crumpling from his knees onto his back, his throat making a continuous hum of pain and confusion.

"Where is he?" Harry asked again, squatting in front of him, knife outstretched.

He felt someone move towards the toilet door and, without blinking, waved his arm behind him. The door grew in its place, popping the bronze hinges and jamming fast against the brick.

The sound was muffled from the other side as someone tried to get in.

Harry pushed he dagger into the attendant's chest once more. The man was unconscious- this was the killing blow, into the very centre at the top of the chest, piercing the throat where the lung tubes met.

Despite how concentrated he was, something moved in his peripheral.

Holding it for a second he surveyed the room. Narrowing his eyes he stared at the mirrors over the urinals, where he thought he'd seen something, but all he saw was the reflection of his the mirror above the sinks, reflected in which was the first mirror, and so on in a strange little vortex.

The automatic flush on the urinals began to dribble water down the metal surface, and Harry stared, but apart from that, at that moment, everything was still.

There was a small explosion behind him and he felt the pulse of magic on his shoulders as he stood, pulling the dagger out swiftly, turning towards the door.

It fell forwards, blasted out of its doorway by a small force of magic and pitching over. The wood fell and landed with a large, hollow bang that echoed around the bathroom and a few bricks fell from the top of the doorway.

On the other side, unnoticed at first by Harry and completely inexplicable, stood a small tabby cat.

He stared, speechless and confused.

Turning to his left he saw a blur of blonde explode from the mirror above the urinals. Something hit him hard as he turned and drove him backwards. Air rushed past him and his lungs emptied as he was driven into- and through- the mirror above the sinks, the tiles and then the wall of the toilet.

Things smashed and broke under the force driving his back onwards and onwards and he closed his eyes, trying to slip into his centre.

He exploded from the other side of the wall.

Before he could even comprehend what was happening he slid to a stop, light flooding his eyes, and drew breath.

He was lying on hard, trodden carpet, looking up at a tall ceiling with chandeliers in it and sound was returning; a person's stutter, a chair scraping, a ine lass smashing as it was dropped… and then all of a sudden a huge mess of chaotic noise as everyone in the main room of the restaurant realised that not only had the wall _exploded_, but _two people_ had come through it.

It was like being at the heart of a volcanic eruption or an earthquake, Harry reasoned quietly. Everything imploded into action and reaction around him- magic was being shot all over the place, people hit the floor either ducking or dead, there was enough movement to make the experience like someone being under a marathon run, plastered to the concrete, unable to move… _then_ someone started letting off gunshots.

Harry blinked, regulating his breathing, watching a chair fly over his head in slow motion, ignoring everything.

_My breathing is not ok,_ he thought. _My back is… _not_ broken. Thank you, God. Anything else..? Yes, a few ribs are broken at the back… one might have punctured my lung. I've lost my shoes. Miraculously, I think that's it._

He stood, in his centre, and watched everything with blank eyes as he began to heal himself.

Everything was moving slower except Saevus- the _vampire bastard_- who was rushing between people, cutting them to pieces with extended claws.

Harry turned on his feet and saw, as though time was so slow he could see seventeen of something left behind every time it moved, Mike taking cover behind a table, firing a tiny handgun wildly into the fray. Harry could see muggles running, arms above their heads… he could also see muggles holding weapons. Mostly handguns… one of the waiters had a sub-machine gun but he was already dead, crumpled against the grand piano in the corner, eyes open, a black ring around one of them.

_The Marksmen,_ he knew, thanking Mike in his head for such utter stupidity.

Of all people, Professors McGonagall and Snape were there, spearing people with precise, effective red spells that dropped them instantly. The expression on the Transfiguration Teacher's face was concentration and justified fury- the expression on Snape's was pure indifference. Bullets exploded against or rebounded from their invisible shields, but they weren't daring to move from their positions.

Another wizard lay dead on the ground near them.

Harry looked around and saw Saevus notice him and grin. His hands came up- in one was his wand, in the other his gun.

A spike of aggression ignited his Art.


	23. The Guns of Stockholm

_Hey._

_I sort of gave up on this – my old PC finally packed it in completely and irredeemably. I was so frustrated with it I tried to forget about everything on it – 2 complete novels, all of my fanfiction, hundreds of songs, poetry, and so on._

_After much waiting and saving I now finally have a new one. I was planning on ignoring requests to continue because this story seems to be cursed – I've written most chapters about 3 or 4 times by now. I also had the plot outline – every little detail – on that hard drive._

_However, the private messages didn't stop coming and neither did the reviews… against my better judgement, I've written this chapter one more time. When it is posted I will break my tradition of writing ahead of the post, and start the next chapter. Despite the fact that where I am in the story of Shujin is about 1/3 of the way complete (if that), I will write chapter by chapter and, assuming nothing goes horribly wrong again, I might one day finish it._

_I apologise to everyone who got into this story once upon a time – I know how irritating it is when you're reading something and everything just grinds to a halt. I was enjoying this story – it was a very different idea and approach for me – but, as I said, it simply seemed like everything to do with it was cursed._

_I will continue. Thank you for sticking with me and badgering me enough to consider writing on._

_G.L._UNFORGIVEN 23 (Mk. III)

* * *

He stared at the receiver for a moment, wondering what was in her mind.

"Your uncle's," he said slowly. "Right now."

"What's going on? What's happening?"

He opened his mouth to respond but jumped in shock, his teeth banging together, at the sound of the explosion.

"_Chto eto_?" he breathed to himself, staring at the door. The screaming started. So did the gunfire. He shouted into the phone, "_Davayte!"_ but she'd already gone.

Swearing under his breath in Russian, the Maitre d' slowly drew out his _Glock 17_, checked it, drew back the slide and felt the reassuring weight as his fingers closed around the grip as firmly and sensitively as a lover's hand.

_Thank you, _he said in his mind. _Thank you for finally allowing me to carry this weapon in a country that does not endorse them._

It had taken him 5 years of loyal service to achieve two things – first, and most importantly, a legitimate cover in Charlie Hume's restaurant (although it could not have been worse timed, it seemed) and, second, the tool of death he was now holding (the timing of which was most fortuitous).

He took a deep, uncertain breath, staring at the door of the cloakroom. _On the other side of that door, _he thought slowly,_ God alone knows what is waiting for me_...

The door banged and reverberated with the impact of someone hitting it. Gunfire rocketed back and forth within the restaurant, no less than fifty feet from the Maitre d's position. It was harsh and loud, like knife wounds in the previously serene atmosphere. It drowned out the screaming.

The body that had hit the door had done so at a run, it turned out. The handle turned and the door opened quickly. The Maitre d' levelled his Glock on instinct.

A body appeared, bundling through the doorway, flooding the dim room with light from outside and illuminating it briefly as he squeezed the trigger.

The woman collapsed instantly – he didn't hear the body hit in the muffled aftermath of the close-range shot.

Slowly, breathing controlled, he walked towards her, gun aimed at the doorway and the unclear activity outside of it. Absently he wiped his cheek of sweat – a little of the 'foundation' makeup he was required to wear over his black ring came off on his hand.

He wiped his entire hand, back and front, on his trousers, leaving a skin-coloured smear. His palm was already sweaty on the grip.

He checked her – she'd been sitting nearby, he remembered vaguely – celebrating an anniversary just shy of Christmas – shot just below the heart.

He put one more round in her forehead to make sure.

Advancing on further, he caught a glimpse of his Book. It had a record of every table's registered name.

Just as he decided it might be fortuitous to grab it, it exploded as a bright blue flash flew into it. He frowned, staring at the place where it had stood, when a man wearing a long, frayed black gown and an unravelling purple cloth around his head walked into his view.

The Maitre d' frowned.

The strangely dressed man extended a hand towards the front of the restaurant and shouted something.

The Maitre d' decided he'd seen enough. He'd heard of wizards – been briefed on them – and had little patience to try and understand it all. He extended his weapon once more, aimed carefully this time, and squeezed the trigger.

Hit.

For the first time, the Maitre d' began to feel a little better about this situation. What- or whoever this man was, he was still no more than that... a man. He lived, breathed, and bled like one... the latter proved by the man's position face down on the ground.

Advancing towards the doorway further, suddenly and inexplicably the entire door and the wall around it exploded violently.

The Maitre d' was thrown from his feet and was unconscious before he hit the ground.

* * *

Severus blinked.

_This isn't going well, _he surmised.

He loosed another shatter-vial from the folds of his robes – one of his last ones. He'd packed them in there years ago and, as he replaced them every month with fresh brews, tended to curse his own paranoia and snort disdainfully at how proud Mad-Eye Moody would be of him.

He threw an orange one – _was it a Sanguacidius? _- flinging himself bodily to one side to avoid an incoming spell and not noting where it landed.

His shield had failed moments ago – Minerva still held hers, he confirmed with a glance – because the strength required to not only deflect projectiles (magical _or _muggle) but to send them back at whoever had projected them was too great to seriously maintain for very long, as Professor Quirrel had discovered. Said Professor had been face down on the floor, almost certainly dead, for nearly five minutes.

He landed heavily on his side, smacking his head squarely on an overturned chair – his vision blotted for a moment but he ignored that and the nausea, concentrating on removing himself from harm's immediate way. Scrabbling, scratching at the floor and somehow retaining his grip on his wand, he moved behind a table, wildly casting a _Carnifico! _in the general direction of the onslaught and praying silently that it took some bastard's head off.

_Give me an old fashioned wizards duel any day, _he mourned. _Getting involved with all of these – these muggle 'gangsters', as Dumbledore put it... firearms being used against me... and all because of Harry flaming Potter..._

Someone staggered out of a doorway behind them. He was unarmed, but the black ring around his eye gave him away as his eyes focused on Severus.

He glanced over at Minerva – she hadn't noticed the man ten feet behind her.

Sighing in his mind, Severus cast a banishment charm at the man – he flew backwards at a rate of knots, going straight through one of the windows.

_Bugger_, he thought sheepishly, tightening his grip on his wand. _Where in Merlin's name is Dumbledore!?_

Without looking he launched another shatter vial over the edge of the table, cast a spell towards someone else that was flanking them who Minerva hadn't noticed, and completely lost his grip on his wand.

A light-blue explosion – cursing dumbly, he found himself hoping that Potter, wherever he was, hadn't been hit by the _Venenum_ _Deleazul _– the 'Blue Wipe Potion'. It exploded on contact with air and disintegrated everything within a ten-foot radius. There would now be a crater in the floor of the restaurant.

_If Potter dies I'm out of the job for certain_, he knew. _My one fucking chance to redeem myself and this is what happens._

He located his wand... too far away. Closer to Minerva than it was to him. _There's no use calling to her – she's being pushed backwards, _he thought furiously, cursing the apparently-faulty Anti-Sweat charm on the wand handle that was supposed to stop this exact thing from happening.

He tried to wandlessly summon it back to his hand, but the table he was behind suddenly began splintering loudly – someone was emptying an entire magazine into the other side of it. A round punched through, a few inches from Severus' face.

_Oh fucking Merlin._

He lurched awkwardly from his breached hiding place, reaching in vain for his wand while throwing his last vial over his head in the direction of the gunfire. The table he'd been behind exploded with the impact of a body hitting it and travelling straight through.

Then he was shot.

It felt like a literal puncture in his right side – all the breath was forced from his lungs and his eyes widened in shock. His mind was blank – he couldn't think anything, couldn't think _of _anything... suddenly nothing mattered.

There was no sound. Everything was muffled, like there was cloth in his ears. All he saw was his wand, a few inches away. His fingers, he noted absently, were reaching for it. Twitching violently – straining to grasp just those _few more inches..._

* * *

_The Blue Berets,_ he thought acidly. _Here come the cavalry._

The two flash, new ARV's pulled up at speed, breaking sharply in a V, and the S019 jumped out in formation facing the restaurant, weapons at the ready.

The one in charge, and the only Authorised Firearm Officer without a gun in his hands, marched over to the Inspector and gave a rough salute and a wink.

"Sergeant Stockholm, reporting, sir. What've we got here?" the man asked briskly.

_Good, I outrank him_, Mason thought. _Barely_.

"What we have, Sergeant," Mason growled, "is trigger-happy coppers with their weapons aimed at a situation we have absolutely _no idea _about."

The sergeant shrugged, correctly assessing the Inspector in a few short seconds.

"I go where I'm told, Guv'," he said simply. "We figured it wasn't hostage – SAS would be all over it if it were. 'Reports of gunfire, rapid response, report to Inspector Mason, FOS'."

"I wasn't first on scene, but I now rank," Mason said grudgingly. "Just make sure your chaps don't kill anyone until I say so."

Stockholm stared blankly at him, incredulous, before remembering his duty and asking, "Anyone come out, Guv'?"

Mason snorted, turning away and indicating the Sergeant to follow him.

"Dozens of people. All hysterical. The one or two we managed to get a hold of, screaming like lunatics, are in ambulances now-" he indicated some blue lights on the other side of the Square- "but we can get very little out of them. One of my lot, though, reckons he saw a black ring around the eye of one of the men running away."

He glared at some press being shooed away – the vultures were beginning to gather.

"Black ring, Guv'? What does that mean?"

Mason stopped in mid-stride, turning to face Stockholm.

"By God, man, are you _completely_ ignorant?" he almost shouted. "You've not heard of the Marksmen?"

The Sergeant's face flushed red.

"Yes, sir, obviously I have heard of the Marksmen. I just transferred out of Brighton and Hove –"

"Christ, man, I don't care where you're from! Black ring around the eye is how you recognise committed, low-level Marksmen. Red ring is how you recognise the lieutenants- usually native Russian. The very top and the very bottom are usually unmarked. That's all you need to know. If this was a Marksmen restaurant then we didn't know about it until now. There were reports of gunfire but the sounds have gone – only the flashes you can see in the windows. _We have no idea what is going on_."

The Sergeant didn't say anything else – he didn't need to. As if on cue, there was the sound of smashing glass.

The two officers spun toward the restaurant to see a man on the floor outside it. He'd flown through a window. He was trying to get to his feet, covered in blood, the surrounding shards glittering off the orange glow of a London night.

Mason stared in shock. As did everyone else present.

Then the man's head came up – his eyes looked dazed and unfocused, but nobody saw that... they only saw the black ring around one of them.

"Christ," Mason breathed. There was movement beside him.

"_Don't move_!" someone screamed – it was Stockholm's deep voice. Mason turned to him to see him levelling a pistol at the man on the floor. "_Armed Police! Do not fucking move_."

Mason's responsibility rushed back to him. He swallowed, then raised an arm to one of the armed coppers looking at him, indicating him to arrest the man.

The SO19 man nodded once, and moved in slowly, weapon trained on the Marksman and the hole in the window where he came from alternately. He was shouting commands.

_I've bagged a Marksman_, Mason thought incredulously while the chaos resumed around him – Stockholm was commanding his small unit, officers were blocking the way of the crowd and press, everyone was doing their job calmly and professionally...

Marksmen – actual, _marked _marksmen – were notoriously difficult to arrest. Difficult to find and, even when you could, they rarely came alive.

_I have one_, Mason thought delightedly, calling his own orders now, watching from the corner of his eye as the armed officer moved closer and the suspect seemed to be co-operating, still in shock.

Then, for the first time in twenty minutes, a loud gunshot cracked like sharp thunder across the Square and the Marksman's head exploded in a wet puff of red mist.

Leicester Square exploded into renewed chaos. Armed Police shot at the restaurant, at the black car a few of them saw the muzzle-flash come from that was speeding away, Stockholm screamed at them to Hold Fire! and Mason, fired up with a Molotov cocktail of hot, pumping adrenaline and absolute, utter fury, ordered all of them to move inside.

* * *

Shujin opened his eyes again.

That last one had taken a lot out of him.

He'd made himself disappear and reappear sporadically throughout the restaurant, keeping Saevus occupied with killing everything _else _in sight. He'd been fighting constantly, though. He'd lost his gun and his knife was lodged in the skull of another Marksman – more and more were flooding down the stairs every so often.

He'd been fighting for what felt like hours, time slowed down around him, but in reality it had only been about ten minutes or so, he imagined... but he was _tired_.

The problem was that Saevus Malfoy _wasn't_.

He took a moment to reload the Colt he'd summoned off the floor – or attempt to reload it. He pressed a button and the empty magazine slid out, but he didn't have any others, or any cartridges to put in, so he dropped the weapon and unsheathed his sword once more.

Deciding to use a little less magic until Saevus was finished ripping the throat out of the latest Marksman to have hurtled down the stairs, needing all his power to heal himself, he slashed through a Marksman who wasn't quick enough to notice him. Blood spattered across his face but he didn't wipe it – he wielded the sword again, towards another unsuspecting muggle Marskman.

A bullet clanged horribly off his sword – the force of it, even with time slowed, knocked it out of Harry's hands. What he saw nearly made him cry – the bullet had gone through the side of the sword, disintegrating on impact, severing about six inches of blade from the top.

_God fucking damn it_, he thought in wild, miserable fury. _Fucking why? Why?_

He leant down and grasped what remained of his dead Sensei's sword, discovering to further horror that it was slightly but noticeably bent.

He grit his teeth, looking towards where the bullet came from, and saw a lone Marksman in a gunfight with Mike, who was somehow still alive. He went to move towards the fray but tripped and landed in a heap in the crater some flying potion had created moments ago –he landed on his back and saw Saevus Malfoy hurtle over the crater, claws extended but unable to stop himself.

_Bastard idiot potions teacher probably just saved my life, _Harry thought incredulously.

He made to stand up before Saevus managed to right himself and go after him again, but found two things had happened as he'd landed. First, a sticky blue residue was coating his cloak, and second, he'd landed on his broken sword, slicing his leg open.

The blood, he saw, was mixing with the blue residue... which was beginning to burn quite viciously.

_Oh fuck_, he thought, not quite believing that things could get worse.

He moved as quickly as he could out of the crater, drawing his wand once more, in time to meet Saevus' next charge.

At exactly the same moment as the impact, another set of bullets entered the fray from the direction of the doorway – one of them hit both he and Saevus, which combined with the impact to tumble them both backwards into the crater.

Harry wasn't sure where he was hit, and didn't much care. He knew he needed to leave. He closed his eyes and tried to concentrate on forcing his Art out of him with the last of his strength, but Saevus' clawed right hand was suddenly on his chest, ripping... clawing... cutting... reaching...

It was the first time Harry had ever felt such pain, he realised with tears in his eyes as Saevus Malfoy tried to burrow his clawed hand into the bullet hole in Harry's chest and tear out his heart.

_Good fucking Lord,_ he thought mildly as he began to black out. _This could be it. This could actually be the end... and Christ Almighty, it fucking hurts._

* * *

Mike stared in shock. He'd killed the persistent Marksman - _obviously someone who remembers me -_ and was about to rush over to where Shujin and Saevus had landed in the crater, but all of a sudden it seemed as though everything might be over.

Armed muggle police began advancing into the restaurant- the first time Mike had seem them- as a tall, powerfully built man in a silk suit walked down the stairs, flanked by four Marksmen with red rings around their eyes.

The man and the police stopped when they saw each other, each equally as shocked as the next, and all sound was suddenly gone. People stopped pulling their triggers and firing off spells... everything was quiet.

Then the man raised his arms in front of his chest, spread them with a light 'chink' sound, and threw something dull and round at the line of armed police. There was a suspended moment of shock for everyone still there, and the man raised his arms again, repeating the motion.

Mike didn't wait – he jumped behind the bar behind him as quickly as he could. He could hear some of the smarter wizards apparating away, somehow still with the strength to do so.

He didn't exactly _hear _the explosion – it just sort of happened. All of a sudden in the silence, noise forced itself into his head and then was replaced by an awful ringing as, a split second later, the bar rocked and split with the wave of the blast.

He didn't hear the sound of automatic weapons firing that replaced it. He just remained with his head down, praying to whoever would listen that it would all go away, while thinking in a small corner in the back of his mind, _Who the fuck brings Grenades to dinner?_

He felt someone apparate to his side. He closed his eyes tighter and almost wept, praying that they wouldn't notice him, but they pulled him over so he was forced to face them, eyes wide, face streaked with blood and dust.

An old woman, pale as the moon, whispering furiously at him.

He stared blankly at her, eyes wide, unmoving.

She realised something, after a moment, and pointed her wand at his head, opening her mouth.

Mike closed his eyes, fearing the inevitable.

A second, stronger shockwave sent her sprawling. He didn't press his advantage – he lay still, realising that Hume had managed to pull the pin on the second grenade before being gunned down.

Mike rolled his head towards the witch – she'd taken a small injury to the head but was alright. She opened her mouth wide to clear her ears, but couldn't, and said something while pointing her wand at her head. There was a bright yellow flash.

She did the same spell on Mike.

All sound rushed back to him in one and he gasped with the shock of it. His ears stopped hurting. He could hear more gunfire. More shouting than before. More death.

"...Harry!?" she was screeching at him.

He stared at her.

Shaking him, she almost sobbed it; "Merlin, _where is Harry_? Where is he!?"

_I'm not Merlin_, he thought, wondering vaguely if he should remember that one to tell Shujin in the afterlife.

He pointed vaguely, then realised to his vague dismay that the end of his finger was missing. He frowned.

"Do you know where? Do you know exactly where?"

He croaked, "...crater..."

Her jaw set.

She turned sharply to a pile of rubble that had fallen from the ceiling next to them. Pointing her wand at a large, broken red brick she closed her eyes.

"_Portus," _she breathed.

She picked it up and handed it to Mike.

"You have fifteen seconds to get this to Harry. Go _now_. I will give you cover."

There was such force in her voice, such a look in her eyes (presumably the one she used when dealing with wayward pupils) that Mike didn't argue.

He went.

* * *

_What a god-awful mess_, Stockholm thought. His remaining four officers were moving out of their covered positions, weapons still aimed at what remained of the crowd on the stairs.

He tried not to think about the view from up there... the view of what was left of _his men_.

They moved slowly...

Slowly...

Out of nowhere, there was movement again.

All at once, the warzone resurrected itself.

One of the bodies on the ground disappeared with a tremendous, booming crack that would eventually stink of ozone. All of the weapons pointed that way, then half of them turned with a shouted order at the other threats arising – one of the men on the stairs, despite missing a leg, had drawn a sawn-off shotgun and was pumping off rounds.

Gunfire came from somewhere else.

It was suddenly every officer for himself – they had to deal with every threat that came up as quickly as possible.

It was chaos once more.

Stockholm saw movement out of the corner of his eye. He spun around, aiming his pistol. A tattooed, Asian-looking man staggered determinedly and at reasonable speed from behind the bar. Flashes of light unlike anything Stockholm had ever seen began to fly from where he'd come from.

He was going to let the man run on – he didn't seem like a Marksman of Mason's description - but noticed the brick in his hand.

He levelled his pistol.

"Don't move!" He shouted over the fray. Realising his words had been drowned in the screams of the now-dying-in-earnest Marksman on the stairs, he shouted, "_Don't move! _Drop the brick! Put your hands on your head and kneel down!"

The man seemed possessed. He kept up his stumbling pace, same as before, but he raised the arm with the brick in it.

A brick is no joke, Stockholm's mind was telling him. If it hits someone on the head it can hospitalise or kill outright.

"Drop the fucking brick, mate!" He shouted, almost pleading, the man's chest in his gunsight.

The man reached a crater in the floor and stopped.

_Thank god, _Stockholm thought as he saw uncertainty on the man's face.

Then he realised that what he saw was not uncertainty... it was despair.

The man, swaying, raised his eyes to meet those of Stockholm's.

Stockholm nodded reassuringly, muttering under his breath, "That's it, mate, drop the brick on the floor, let's all go home alive, just let it fall son, do as I tell you and everything'll be okay..."

Suddenly, the man reared back his arm as if to throw the brick, screaming his head off.

"_Fuck!" _Stockholm grunted as the officer next to him pulled his trigger and the man's chest burst into red.

Then there was silence – the man, in a flash of blue, had disappeared...

Stockholm mournfully signalled his colleague to move in – he could not have just disappeared, surely... _dead men don't just disappear_, he thought. He was probably in the crater.

He and the other officer moved in – the first one, having reached the place first, looked at Stockholm and shrugged in confusion.

Sergeant Stockholm reached him, eyes scouring the ground... there was nothing in the crater or on the floor around it.

He reached for radio on his vest.

It was the last thing he ever did.

* * *

On the stone floor of an almost-deserted Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry's entrance hall, what was left of Mike Chow appeared in a flash of blue light, landing in a wet heap on the cold surface.

The half-brick clattered away from him.

A few moments afterwards, Minerva McGonagall burst through the front doors of the school. Floating behind her she had Professors Snape and Quirrel, horizontal and unconscious.

Headmaster Dumbledore appeared on the stairs approximately one minute later, looking mournful as he walked down towards the scene – Minerva McGonagall was crying on the floor next to the unconscious and probably dying Asian gentlemen, wailing at the top of her voice that the man was alone.

* * *

For the second time that night, Rebecca Hume was on her car phone.

"Sven? Sven, listen to me – calm down," she said into the mouthpiece, growing impatient. "Are you still there? Good. Listen. You will first of all check and double check the wiring, as quickly as you can, then you will flip the switch and _then_ you will contact Maccy to organise the credit. Is that quite clear? Yes? You understand? Exce – yes, I know. I know. Go and do it."

She listened for a few more seconds before pressing the End Call button on the armrest and dialling again.

_My pulse is controlled, _she realised. _Good. I need to be calm. I need to get on with things._

She put the phone to her ear again and listened.

"Da," she heard after two rings.

"Kristof – in a few moments my uncle's restaurant will explode. You needed to be informed."

"Yes – why?"

"It was compromised. The police have it."

"Where is Mr. Andrevsky?" He asked, using her uncle's birth name after assuring the phoneline was secure.

"He is inside, Kristof," she said, the hairs on the back of her neck standing up.

A deep breath on the other end, before, "I see. Very well. Is that all?"

"The IRA will be taking the credit."

"Is that necessary?"

"Yes, Kristof. The police are involved. Sven is making the calls."

"I will remake the calls. Good evening, Miss Hume."

The line went dead. Rebecca Hume sighed, thrilled but exhausted. The rifle on the floor of the car would in a few minutes be dropped into the Thames – if the driver hurried up, that is.

She tried to breathe out her tension, inhaling and exhaling deeply, slowly, fingers twitching and shoulder hurting... it was the first time she'd used a rifle to kill someone, ever. It was always in the car – in all of the cars, usually – and she'd always known how, but until tonight she had not needed to.

_Now to finish the job, _she started thinking...

Then there was someone in the car with her. He appeared without a crack or any sort of usual arrival when it came to wizards. No fanfare. Nothing but a sudden appearance.

Her breath caught in her throat... she knew who it was.

"Evening, Miss Hume," he said, his voice calm. "I think we need to talk."


	24. The Simplicity of Falling

_Hey._

_Cheers for the responses._

_First of all, I've tried hooking up the old hard drive to my new one, but the engineer who was supposed to be fixing my PC in the first place, or at least retrieving the memory and data, gave me nothing but a mournful look and a single word – 'fried'. At that point I continued to try things and different places and people (who all had the same reaction) and unfortunately nothing has worked. It doesn't register it as anything via USB because the fucking box won't turn on._

_Thanks for the suggestions anyway._

_With regards to the suggestion about the British dinner... look mate, very simply, even if Yorkshire Puddings were on every set menu in Britain – even if English children were very likely to eat on a regular basis what is almost a delicacy in __**my country**__ – that does not mean that Harry would._

_A bit like a firstborn child, this chapter just sort of... fell out of nowhere. It's shorter than I'd wanted but... everything's in it that needs to be, as far as I can tell. And, hey, finally a few ANSWERS! :O_

_Going as fast as I can guys... if you think you could go faster try working for my boss._

_Cheers,_

_G.L._

* * *

UNFORGIVEN 24

* * *

Harry didn't know how long he'd been there, but _there_ was where he was, and he wasn't sure how he'd leave.

Floating, almost – bodiless...

There were stars above him but there was nothing below him.

_Mad fucking trip_, his mind garbled through the clouds.

Everything was darkness. It was different to how it'd been when he nearly died – that dream-world purgatory with the brickwork floors – because he wasn't a person here. He was just, sort of... an entity.

A thing. He wasn't alive or dead or in the middle somewhere.

But he existed.

He tried to move forward but... well, he had no idea what way _was _forward. He wasn't even facing a particular direction – he was facing _all _directions.

_I was wrong before_, he thought. _Maybe this one is death. Only one way to find out..._

He pushed with all his being in what he thought was a single direction – he felt his existence stretch horrifically. Every particle in his being pulled itself away from every other particle. He spread out into transparency.

He wasn't breathing anyway, but at that point it felt like he didn't even have lungs with _which_ to breathe... all of the air escaped from in them through the massive gaps between every little thing that made him Shujin.

_Maybe not, then_.

He tried to move backwards, the way he'd come from... he tried to right the wrong.

It stretched him farther – it now felt like his being, his entity in the blackness, was splitting at the seams.

One by one, the connections were breaking.

_Fuck_, he thought, mind racing now, no more garbled thoughts, no more pretence... this was really starting to get uncomfortable.

He decided not to move for the moment, even though his every ounce of being that remained was screaming at him to rip himself away from everything that was starting to ... _hurt_.

Real pain, this time, too. Dull pain, sharp pain, deep and shallow, it rung and reverberated across every particle as each one vibrated, trying to reconnect, striving and reaching desperately as fast as possible to reattach themselves to every other particle.

He realised he was probably screaming.

He tried, instead of moving one way, to move _inside_. To move _into _himself. To push all of him back into a single existence.

In a flash, like he was being sucked out of nothingness, everything went white around him, like a flash of fire as a phoenix reawakens...

* * *

Then everything was grey... but not an ethereal, hazy, mysterious grey... more the grey of an overcast morning...

Air was still rushing past him, or vice versa, but in a far more casual, indefinite kind of way. There was no discomfort in it... although, when his ability to feel what was inside him returned (he was numb from frostbite, it turned out later on), he felt a true, deep and incomprehensible pain.

He looked down, pleased to feel the weight of his head once more but a little unnerved to find out two things – first of all, he was completely naked.

Second of all, and in retrospect far more worthy of attention, the air was rushing past him because he was falling through it.

All below him, laid out like a dull patchwork quilt, countryside stretched as far as he could see.

But it was getting closer, slowly – the air got heavier and his lungs refilled themselves with it, but it was starting to irritate what skin he could still feel, and the freezing air burnt his lungs and he had to close his eyes, and when he opened them he found himself that little bit closer to the ground.

Noticeably closer.

It was as though the Earth had realised he was there, just out of sight, like a lazy dragon notices a mouse in its cave...

_It's a playful dragon_, Harry thought. _It wants to play with the unsuspecting mouse_. _But it's started bounding towards me- rolling like a boulder. It will surely roll right over me..._

How many ways could he say it, a voice asked him from nowhere. He wasn't sure but didn't answer, not wanting to appear as though he was beginning to go insane with terror.

_The analogy of my analogy is my friend._

There was no light way to look at it now... no playful dragons and rolling boulders... he was plummeting towards the Earth, back towards a peaceful, rural civilisation, at whatever speed it was that people reached when doing such a thing... certainly a lot faster than it felt.

Everything was getting bigger now – everything was getting faster...

The air was _much _heavier here. Much, much heavier. He could feel it lashing at his face.

He found himself focusing on a tree. He knew it was a tree now because he wasn't far above it.

In fact he lost sight of it behind some other trees.

He didn't know what types they were. The thought made him unhappy.

He was hurtling towards a rooftop... he hadn't even realised it was there until he'd got this close, so preoccupied was he with the tree.

_Thank God,_ he thought. _Thank you, God, for putting a house here to break my fall._

God smiled down, surely.

_It's not thatched_, was the last thing that ran through his head.

* * *

It was Christmas Day.

Hogwarts was still.

Albus Dumbledore sat, staring at Michael Sung Chow – the uncle of one of his students.

_How are you involved in this, my boy? _He wondered, eyes sad as he surveyed the man who had once been his ward. _And how did you go so far astray?_

Mike Chow had been the ward of the school before he'd been expelled.

Dumbledore was trying to remember the name and face of his foster father – the elderly Chinese gentleman who had picked him up from the gates all those years ago...

Unable to recall, he shook his head, sighing.

Apart from the two of them, the ward was empty, Dumbledore double-checked before standing up and making his way towards a bedside cupboard he'd commissioned off of Poppy when he'd moved to Mike Chow's side the day before.

From within it, he pulled two things – the first was a bundle of charred clothes, and the second was his Pensieve.

Slowly, he carried both to the desk he'd conjured next to Mike's cot, and set them down.

One more look around – _I am alone_, he concluded.

He put the tip of his wand into the Pensieve and waited patiently while it stirred itself.

_I wish Minerva had been more coherent_, he thought, sighing. Professor McGonagall had been very reluctant to say anything about what had happened, but had unfortunately seen the most. Instead of talking about it, he'd agreed to simply watch her memories of the evening, from when he'd dispatched her after Harry was located once more by Severus, handing her a _Glamulet_, to when she'd appeared once more in the Entrance Hall.

He was a little apprehensive, but curiosity won over.

_I have to know what happened._

He leant over the stone bowl and the tip of his nose touched the surface, pulling him headfirst into Christmas Eve.

* * *

He came around slowly.

Nothing hurt... incredibly, everything felt amazing. He was euphoric, but the happiness was fading slowly.

Groggily, he stared at the ceiling.

_More grey_, was his first thought.

"Dobry wieczor", a voice said.

Slowly, with heavy eyelids and a recalcitrant neck, Harry looked towards the foot of the bed.

"What?" he asked, tongue heavy, his voice halting.

_How I managed to slur 'What' I have no idea, _he thought.

"Angielsku?" the man asked. He was wearing long, pale blue robes. "In-gliss?"

Harry watched tiredly as the man pointed what was unmistakeably a wand at him.

Before he could protest or defend himself, an unspoken spell washed him in some invisible force. It felt like he'd been dunked into lukewarm water from head to toe.

The feeling did not wear off.

"_Do you understand me?_" the man said, but his words were out of sync with his mouth.

Harry fought off how similar it was to when Mar spoke to him.

"Er – yes," he said, but could not clearly hear his own voice. The man smiled, relieved. "Where am I?"

"_You are in hospital_," he said, his lips still out of sync, smiling but unsure. "_Do you know how you got here_?"

"No," Harry said quite honestly. "What happened?"

"_My colleagues and I were hoping you could tell us_," the man said, now not smiling. "_What is the last thing you remember_?"

"Falling..." Harry said, the unpleasant memory floating back towards the surface of his consciousness. His eyes scoured the rest of the room.

"_Really? Hmm._.." the man considered. "_A house exploded near Grójec. Fortunately, someone was driving nearby when it happened – she went straight to a telephone in a station nearby and called the services. You were the only living thing recovered from the wreckage. Obviously, the muggle doctors had never seen anything like it_."

"Good for them," Harry groaned, trying to sit up but finding himself unable to. He checked to make sure he wasn't tied down... fortunately he was not, but unfortunately that meant he was simply too weak to move.

_Yet_.

"_Not as such_," the man said quietly. "_Incredibly, though, you fell onto one of only two hundred wizarding houses in Poland, so the correct services were available to take you in once the muggles determined that you should be dead. Rather less fortunate was the fate of the family inside the house – six of Poland's one thousand registered wizards, killed by an 11 year old boy who fell out of the sky. A boy who is apparently English, which would suggest that he knows exactly what the scar on his head means_."

_Scar on my..? _He thought, and then froze. _Oh shit._

"How did I fall out of the sky? Did you figure anything out?"

"_You do not remember_?"

"Nope," he tried to shrug. "Remember falling, but before that it's all a bit of a blur."

"_How mysterious_," the man said, smiling once more. "_Your injuries were most impressive – accepting the fact you 'fell' into a wizarding house, which would explain how every bone in your body was broken, the haemorrhaging and the many internal bruises, I'm still struggling to determine how exactly an eleven year old boy ended up with a bullet wound, a heart that had stopped beating from external lacerations and a vampire bite on his neck._.."

"A _what?_" Harry shouted with a cracking voice, eyes wide.

"_A vampire bite, young man_," he said sympathetically. "_Fortunately, there are such remedies for these things that, should the patient reach a determined group of healers in time, he might just be saved from becoming a Dark creature._"

Harry stared at him, horrified.

"I'm a vampire?"

"_No, young man. Not yet. That is what I've just said. Is the translation charm failing? Let me reapply it_-"

Harry shook his head angrily.

"The cunt bit me," he whispered hoarsely. "The cunt actually bit me. I cannot believe it. I cannot fucking believe it."

The man, for the first time, actually looked quite shocked.

"_I see you have found your voice_," he said slowly, his mouth finishing the sentence before the words stopped._ "Further testing is required, but you don't appear to have had any Vampiric reactions."_

"Yes," Harry said through gritted teeth, now feeling a lot stronger. "I have found my voice. As soon as I have found everything else belonging to me, I will leave."

"_Well, you appeared as you are, young man_," the Healer said. "_We fitted you with a hospital gown while we waited for your recovery. I must say, I did have to admire some of the runic work on your skin, although the tattoo was a little crude. With regards to the manner of your departure... I can arrange someone to pick you up and take you back to England, after we've discerned exactly how you came to be here and whether you are liable to pay some sort of penance for the deaths of that family._"

A thought struck Harry like a wet slap.

"What day is it? How long was I dead?"

"_You were dead for a few minutes only, by our estimate_," the Healer said. "_But you have been with us now for two days. It is the 26__th__ December, 1991._"

Without another word, Harry closed his eyes tightly, trying to summon an emotion strong enough to flower his Art.

_Anaesthetic is still too strong to use pain_, he realised. _Or anger. Gotta be... panic. I am fucking late, so panic it is._

Slowly, the emotion flourished within him, and the deepest swells of it briefly ground along the peaks of his dormant Art.

It caused a spark, like a knife on flint.

The spark took him far away from the Polish healer... and just in time. Before he slipped out of existence again, he caught a glimpse of the man, face contorted in a scowl, wand aimed straight at his chest, mouth forming words that didn't translate from Polish into English.

He slid into darkness.

* * *

Tears in his eyes, he looked at the now dormant swirls of memories in the Pensieve.

He'd just seen everything – from Minerva arriving, glamour applied, in the restaurant disguised as a dishevelled muggle alcoholic ... how she eventually pushed the bathroom door down ... Harry standing over that black man, dagger in hand ... then the violence that erupted in the restaurant.

Albus Dumbledore was angry.

_Very _angry.

His mind was a chaos of furious questions, from _Why did I let him have the weapons back!? _to _Who applied the Suppression Charm on the restaurant that stopped me from heading there?_

Nothing was clear to him. Nothing at all.

Unable to think of anything to do, he stared at Mike Chow, deliberately wasting as much time as possible before re-emerging himself in the memory, from the beginning, so he could take a closer look.

_Still breathing, Michael, _he thought, decidedly less fatherly in his mental tone now that he'd seen the Chinese man wielding a pistol in such a way, even if he had tried to save Harry. _Still breathing._

He had no idea what to feel about Harry Potter. Absolutely no idea.

_Nothing is clear_, he thought again, gritting his teeth and leaning into the Pensieve once more.

* * *

He landed in the alley with a loud, uncomfortable grunt.

Falling to his knees, he vomited blood, through his nose and mouth and straight over his hospital gown.

Swaying, he extended an arm and steadied himself, still on his knees, using the cold, red-brick wall.

_That was a really horrible feeling_, he decided. _No more magic for a little while, methinks._

Everything was tender – he was in a pretty bad way but still grateful that he was still alive, after being shot, torn apart and dropped from thirty thousand feet into the Polish version of the Weasley household.

After a few minutes of kneeling there, Shujin staggered to his feet and started moving through the streets of London once again.

* * *

Albus Dumbledore did not weep this time, in anger or in anything else.

Determinedly blocking most of the memories from his consciousness, knowing that watching it a second time had done nothing to alleviate his befuddlement, he breathed through his nose slowly, turning from the Pensieve to the pile of charred clothing.

The ashes and shreds of remaining material came apart in his hands as he went through what remained of Harry Potter's clothing.

To his immense surprise, he tore one piece apart and out rolled a ... _trunk._

An unscratched, unscathed, shrunken trunk.

Had he had a moment before flying into a blind rage, he'd have admired the spell-craft.

* * *

It had taken him just five minutes after he started moving to recognise where in London he was, and a further three minutes to _acquire_ some clothing from a washing line on a low balcony. He'd received some very strange looks before he'd changed, but knowing the backstreets as he did, only a few people actually caught a glimpse of him as he stumbled across the Capital.

Eventually, dressed and looking as anonymous as possible, he found himself walking with the sparse Boxing Day crowds across Waterloo Bridge. He kept his head low and tried to limp and stagger as little as he could.

He was heading towards Charing Cross road.

When he reached the other side of the bridge and the north bank of the River Thames, he glanced over at a newsstand and the unhappy little man behind it, breathing into his hands.

His eyes caught the headline on one of the displayed periodicals;

**I.R.A. LEADERS WISH 'MERRY CHRISTMAS' WITH LONDON BOMB BLAST**

Frowning, with an acute sense of aimlessness despite his determined heading, he moved on faster.

* * *

She hadn't reached the rifle fast enough.

The vampire was quicker.

He'd grabbed her by the throat when she'd leaned forward, prompting her driver to stop the car and draw a weapon.

She was alright. She was unharmed, apart from a few bruises around her neck.

Her driver had been crucified on the top of the vehicle before Saevus had pushed it into the Thames. He'd quite happily sat down with her afterwards, though, and apologised for his rudeness.

It had all been for nothing anyway, though. He'd received her blessing to continue hunting Shujin, and been assured that there was no bad blood (no pun intended) between them for the murder of the Marksmen in the restaurant.

As it turned out, for all his aptitude, Saevus Malfoy had no idea about the political workings of their organisation – of which she was now the leader.

He had no idea the service he'd already done her.

So she'd told him the money was still his when he killed the boy, and encouraged him to proceed with all haste.

That was when, Rebecca Hume reflected in her North Kensington office, he'd told her something very interesting indeed...

Something very interesting about the wizards' bank, Gringotts...

She sipped her tea – black, no sugar – and signed her papers, thinking about gold, thinking about witches and wizards, and thinking about how she would reshape and redefine the Marksmen.

She was in a very good mood.

Very few people knew or understood that 'Marksmen' was a mistranslation – it was supposed to be, as her grandfather had intended when he came to England long before she was born with nothing more than the clothes on his back and the stars on his knees, nothing more than an ultra-violent, unofficial representation of the Soviet Union and the Bolsheviks (from whom he was descended – _his_ father had known Lenin very closely).

They were intended to be, not 'marksmen', which signified some sort of Assassin's creed, but '_Marx_ Men'.

Since that day, though – since the day he'd walked the shores of the United Kingdom for the first time – he'd fallen into the trap that many men did... the trap of Greed.

He saw firsthand the money to be made in crime.

He'd lifted his amateur organisation's taboo with regards to Blacks, Jews and Asians – no more were they pariahs. He opened the door, unlike his fellow Russian patriarchs, to many, many distasteful people, and reaped the profits.

Rebecca was a great admirer of her family, with a profound respect for lineage.

She'd almost single-handedly organised the assassination of the traitorous Bulgarian on Waterloo Bridge 13 years before, for two reasons – one, the KGB were paying her father handsomely for it, and two, to celebrate her grandsire's 50th birthday.

_Those were the days_, she thought smugly, after her brief allowed moment of catharsis. _But things are going to change._

* * *

Harry walked into the _Leaky Cauldron_, heaving with revelling patrons, head held low, and made his way towards the back of the pub.

His eyes rose to check the numbers of the private rooms towards the back of the establishment.

He found the right one.

He checked around himself and, with a deep breath and pulling his beanie lower, he turned the knob and walked inside, coming face to face with...

Lucius Malfoy.

Harry stopped dead still, staring, checking and double checking it was not _Saevus _Malfoy.

The door closed slowly behind him, cutting off the sounds of the Leaky Cauldron.

"What in Merlin's name are _you _doing here?" the blonde man said imperiously, one eyebrow arched in distaste.

Harry looked around the room quickly, then at the man's face, eyes narrowed.

"There's been a change of plan," he said.

"Oh, has there?" the Malfoy said, smiling now, enjoying himself as he turned to face Harry fully, long hair swept backwards, cane and robes arranged perfectly.

"Yes," Harry said, breathing deeply, wishing he had his wand. "Mike's dead. It's just me and you, now, Taye."


	25. The Preceding Serenity

_Thanks all for the response._

_Many thanks to wolf550e for helping me correct the brief Russian. If anyone can help me correct the Polish, please send me a pm. I'm very grateful for assistance with regards to language (even English – mistypes are the bane of my writing career)._

_There is no excuse for the lateness of this chapter- I hope the content makes up for it. It was not easy to rewrite and I've had to make restructuring an art._

_Happy New Year via the Christian calendar._

_Cheers & Peace, G.L.

* * *

  
_

Professor McGonagall sat alone in her chambers.

Still she could not sleep.

Over and over in her mind, she saw the events of Christmas Eve – they did not stop. Indeed, when she closed her eyes they only seemed to roll faster and clearer than before.

Harry Potter of her house?

_Harry Potter, the murderer._

Harry Potter of her classes?

_Harry Potter, the equal of vampires._

Harry Potter, the son of James and Lily Potter?

_Harry Potter taking a bullet..._

Minerva McGonagall was not an easy woman to shake up. She'd seen a _lot _of happenings in her life, from growing up in an orphan in Arinagour; as an academic and Ministry employee; as a teacher from '56; during the War... not many things would make her stop in her tracks.

Not many things could actually make her lose sleep.

She could not believe what she'd seen of the young Potter. He'd never ceased to surprise her – from his appearance on the first day to his excellent performance in classes – but the most recent revelations had made her doubt almost everything she thought herself to know.

_But, _the thought wrenched itself from her clouded psyche, _he is still my student._

She shook her head, rubbing her eyes, trying to maintain her composure for her own sake if no-one else's.

_I don't even know if he's still alive, _she reasoned. _I saw him shot – he and that Chinese gentleman I recognised briefly... the ex-student. Chai? No... Chow, or something like it._

She stood abruptly, knocking her cup and saucer off the arm of the chair. They landed on the stone floor – the cup smashed but the saucer didn't. Tea with brandy splashed in droplet laces under her desk.

On instinct she raised her wand – although she hadn't realised she had it in her hand – and pointed it at the mess – the broken china and the saucer still clattering.

Without thinking, she transfigured it where it was instead of vanishing it... she could feel it. It happened quickly but she could feel every strand, every particle within it, changing... that was her skill. That was her natural gift for transfiguration. The shards of china and the liquids and all of it moved as one entity, thinned out and forming colour, bending and becoming softer, writhing amongst the other pieces like a pile of snakes, until...

A teatowel.

She closed her eyes, physically restraining herself from swaying on the spot, surprised she wasn't smiling.

_What do I need to do? _She asked herself with her eyes closed. _I need to head to St Mungos and check that Severus is properly recovering. I need to check in on Professor Quirrel in the dungeons. I need to... to go and see Albus._

_I need to make some sense of everything, but that is a lower priority._

She sniffed, straightening her back, but something caught her eye – the teatowel she'd just transmogrified.

Sickened, she stared at it – a black and white and red depiction of what she saw in the bathroom of the restaurant.

Harry Potter's silhouette standing over the bathroom attendant.

"Oh, for goodness' sake," she muttered, vanishing the whole thing with a sweep of her wand.

Straightening her robes out, she set her jaw and walked towards the fireplace.

* * *

"Hmm?" Taye said, with a frown as Malfoy Senior. "Dead?"

Harry sighed, snapping, "Yes. He was killed at that restaurant thing."

"The IRA attack?"

Harry eyed him.

"You honestly believed it was IRA?"

"Of course not," Taye hissed, suddenly with a short South African bite. "It was the fucking Marksmen again, as always, but why was Mike there?"

Harry didn't answer, too weary to go into detail. He moved to the slumbering fireplace.

"I was assured," Taye said, "that the Marksmen were not involved in this little job. Mike was finished with them. _Why was he there, brat?"_

Harry looked at him again – when you looked closer, you could see some of Taye behind the cosmetics. Minor tells to be sure, but they were there – especially when he scowled in such a petulant and nervous way.

"Stop making such a stupid face," he said quietly, looking away once more. "If someone looks closely they'll see it isn't him. I wish you'd let me magic you into him, for Christ's sake..."

Taye spat a gobbet onto the dusty floor of the tavern's private chamber.

"The _hell _with your magic, little prick that you are. They're fuckin' goblins anyway, eh? They'll know sooner or later," he said, and Harry felt him turn away again. "Bastard – I've come out of character now – that's the only thing that's going to keep them believing, at the end of the day, no? And Mike killed in an attack on or by the Marksmen, mm? This just gets better and better."

"Just glare imperiously at anyone staring at you," Harry said, rubbing his forehead. "What time is it?"

"We're overdue – because you're fucking late and the chinky's fucking dead and I've been sitting in this _fucking wizard shit-end of no-fucking-where for three hours_. Where are the keys?"

Harry stopped dead, eyes widening.

_There is no just God, _he decided.

Taye was silent for a few moments.

"Oh – oh, right – let me fuckin' guess, eh? You haven't got the keys? Or better yet – Mike had the keys, and they've been blown to kingdom fucking come, eh?"

Harry stared, speechless, into the empty fireplace.

Taye continued, his voice rising, shouting, "Maybe the Marksmen were looking after the keys, eh? Maybe that's what this all was about – _maybe that's where this whole thing was going to go wrong from the fucking start, eh?_"

"Stop shouting," Harry instructed vaguely. His face creased into a frown as he turned to Mike, asking, "Are you drunk?"

Taye span towards him, his Malfoy robes whirling.

"What?" he spat.

"Are you fucking _drunk, _Taye?" Harry asked, the hairs on the back of his neck raising.

"Drunk?" Taye said, leering. "That's relevant, uh? Of course I'm drunk, you little fuck – I haven't done a job sober in thirty years. It helps me concentrate, and calms my fucking nerves, which is great in the case of some little arse-fucking child involving the fucking Marksmen in a - "

Before he could finish, Harry was upon him, striking his neck.

Taye hissed and his fist lurched up to meet Harry's chin as he buckled – Harry was knocked backwards slightly, taken by surprise, but managed to lift a leg and kick Taye in the stomach as he went down.

A suppressed shot went off by his waist and he jolted away from the heat of it – Taye had pulled a gun from somewhere in the robes.

As he went down, with a flailing leg, Harry kicked the gun from Taye's grip – almost. Taye held on, barely, and rolled with the force of the blow on his hand, the silencer-fitted handgun going off once more and the blowback forcing the weapon back into Taye's palm.

Harry, on his back, lashed out with his legs, trying to restrain his art in the heat of the moment, trying desperately to hold himself out of his centre.

Taye's free hand grabbed Harry's clothing as he tried to roll free and the wizard sensed the handgun coming around once more. He lurched awkwardly forwards, off of his back and into a seated position, forcing the extended barrel away from his face as it went off yet again, striking at Taye's latex-disguised face with his other hand, no longer caring about the disguise's validity.

Some fingers dug into the nerve-knots in his shoulder and Harry felt his legs go numb – he realised as he was pummelled that he was the only person holding the gun, though it was by the warm silencer itself – he couldn't reach his other arm around to grasp the handle.

Harry tried to think as he wrestled and grappled with a stunned but very capable killer on the floor of the Leaky Cauldron... if he tried to flip the gun into his hand and didn't catch it, he'd drop it. Holding it as it is would allow Taye to grab it again at will. Flinging it away would surrender any advantage of holding it. Using his Art..? He'd probably pass out and be murdered unconscious.

_Act, Shujin, _he told himself furiously, exhausted and frustrated.

Despite the torn latex hanging over his eyes, one of Taye's hands found Harry's windpipe and the fingers pinched purposefully.

Harry lurched backwards, his arm coming down and swinging the gun handle-first into Taye's nose.

To his surprise and despair, Taye was once again only stunned, and after a brief moment pitched forwards, blood not-quite-yet pouring from his nose, tumbling onto the lighter, weakened Harry and grabbing the handgun.

Harry tried to get his mind into gear – tried to focus – as he used his elbow to pummel Taye's face some more.

"Stupid _fuck_," Taye screamed gutturally, spittle covering Harry's face. "In Botswana, at your age, I - "

Harry never got to find out exactly what Taye did in Botswana – at that exact moment, stilling their contest completely, the fireplace exploded with green flames.

* * *

_I need to feed..._

The mantra rolled through his head continuously as he watched the doorway from the corner of the street.

It was an overcast day but Saevus was taking a risk – the weather was predicted to clear up. He didn't care though – he was becoming obsessive.

_I need to feed..._

For an entire day he'd hunted the mark – the boy – Shujin. For an _entire day_... Christmas day. When he should have been tormenting his family, he was out non-stop, searching for some trace of where Shujin had gone after vanishing from his grasp.

Now, he'd found him. He'd watched him from the bridge earlier on – he'd followed carefully, trying to catch him alone, wondering all along... had the venom caught him?

Was he beginning to turn..?

_I need to feed..._

He wouldn't put it past little Shujin to have somehow escaped that fate, but still – his teeth had sunk into him and he'd injected his curse without a doubt before the boy had disappeared.

_Are you yet my slave, boy? _He asked.

It was a good sign that he was alive – many mortals are not strong enough to sustain vampirism, and succumb to the curse as though to a serious fever... before they turn completely they are dead. Age is irrelevant – the required strength is in soul.

...and in potential.

_I _need_ to feed..._

If he had not turned, Saevus would not try again. He swore that to himself – if it had failed once it would surely fail again anyway... no, he knew he'd had his chance.

Now the only fate that awaited him was death.

_I need to FEED..._

He groaned, leaning against the window he was next to, legs almost caving in with the weight of the curse... with the agony of unquenchable thirst...

He craved the boy's blood – little had ever been craved in a deeper or more perverse way. It was not the same desire that would drive Greek pederasts after young boys... it was not sexual, although the primitive lust and ultimate satisfaction would no doubt be similar... no, it was a deeper, more arcane and simple craving, and more powerful for it.

He, a being of darkness and death, would sup on the nectar of a strong, good, heartfelt and meaningful life...

Unable to bear it anymore, he turned and staggered across Diagon Alley to the shadows of Knockturn on the other side. He _had _to feed, or he'd go insane with frustration and either tear into the magically-crowded Leaky Cauldron in a frenzy, or go irreversibly demented right there on the Alley itself.

Feeding off of some lesser being would sustain him for the moment, and would unfortunately temporarily destroy his hunger, but he couldn't time his Urges – his curse controlled _him_, not the other way around.

Saevus would have to try to save the boy until he really, _really _felt it again... only then would Shujin know the sheer horror of a Vampire's respect.

* * *

The flames turned green with a loud _whoosh_, and Minerva McGonagall landed in the room.

Poppy Pomfrey jumped out of her chair with a start, unused to someone such as the Professor intruding in such a drastic and discourteous manner. The parchment she was reading drifted off of her desk.

"Professor!?" she exclaimed, trying to regain her composure.

McGonagall looked around the office, eyes tired and looking quite dishevelled, only half-heartedly dusting herself off.

Quirrel was fine – he had been interrupted while repairing his charred purple turban, his head smooth and healed properly, muttering to himself quietly. She'd offered to check his head again for him but he assured her it was just a graze and going back to the way it was very nicely. As tempted as she'd been to, she didn't tell him he should have been on his feet and fighting for longer if it was a mere graze...

Snape was conscious and very unhappy in his St. Mungo's accommodation. Speaking to the healers had confirmed he would be out and fighting fit that evening despite the lacerations to his lung, which was healing sufficiently quickly, and also confirmed that she could safely collect his memory of the evening for Albus' perusal and comparison.

After evading the curious Aurors outside the door of the chamber she'd managed to; she held the small, glass vial of silvery Thought in her right hand and her wand in her left.

"Apologies, Poppy," she said with a perfunctory smile. "I didn't mean to intrude. Is the Headmaster still here?"

Flustered, the matron muttered an affirmative and bustled over to the doorway, for some reason slowing a little as she got closer. Minerva stood back and allowed her to open the door for her, then stepped through after her, and like Poppy, for some strange reason she found herself wanting to turn back...

There was a beat of heart-stopping confusion until Poppy's cry was distinguishable from Minerva's only in pitch.

"_Albus_?" the transfiguration teacher breathed after the chorus, as Poppy rushed over to him.

On the floor of the hospital wing laid Albus Dumbledore, unconscious, and bleeding from his temple where a gunshot had grazed him months before. His robes were crumpled and in a few places torn, and his pensieve was on the ground next to him, cracked and broken down the middle, the memory all evaporated.

As Poppy began to cast furious diagnostic charms on the prone Headmaster, McGonagall looked at the mess that was the rest of the room – the site of a very serious and very deadly duel; the floor was scorched, the windows broken, half of the beds and bed-curtains were destroyed or mangled, and a few had been piled into the middle in what was now nothing more than a burnt husk.

Confused, McGonagall closed her eyes and tried to get her bearings. Still frowning, she turned towards the open door into the matron's office and reflexively cast her own diagnostic charm.

_Not quite an Imperturbable Charm... no - a Suppression Charm_, she registered. _A very, very powerful Suppression Charm... the rest of the castle could have been ripped away by tornado and Poppy wouldn't have even realised. So it was Mr. Chow who cast the one in the restaurant in London that stopped Albus and the aurors from apparating in..._

She closed her eyes once more and shuddered, wondering just who on Earth young Harry Potter had got himself mixed up with.

And yet, somehow, things were beginning to make some sense.

_Alright, _her well-ordered but heavily-tried mind began. _Top priority – where is Chow? He somehow bested Albus – most likely took him by surprise. Next Priority – Albus himself. Finally – until the Headmaster is fully recovered, I need to take it upon myself to find Harry Potter._

She nodded briskly and turned back to the room, for the moment ignoring Poppy and the still Headmaster. Her sharp eyes, so often tested in the classroom, soon found something... a small velvet pouch.

She tried to summon it and, for some reason, it didn't work – as she moved closer she discovered why.

It was the Headmaster's Floo Pouch – he wore it inside one of his sleeves. It was resistant to summoning and magical detachment, but... _yes, _she saw as she reached it.

_The small, golden cord has been cut, _she told herself. _And the pouch is empty. That explains the pyre in the middle of the room – Chow used it to escape._

She cursed under her breath. It was hard enough to track a registered Floo Network firecall... this would be almost impossible.

_Unless he Floo'd to a registered fireplace address..?_

She knew she'd be using some of her own pouch very soon, but first –

"Madam Pomfrey," she said, the volume of her voice seeming almost disrespectful. "How is he?"

On her knees, the nurse leant back, wiping her palms on her gown and shaking her head fretfully.

"From the looks of it he's been cursed badly – a botched version of the Coma Curse first of all, presumably to no effect on its own, but combined with a Stunner too? He'll be out for – for..." she seemed to struggle to say it, but soldiered on, finishing with, "out indefinitely, maybe. Until the caster undoes it or – or dies himself."

McGonagall couldn't believe her ears.

"He could be unconscious _indefinitely?" _she whispered.

"It isn't certain – botched curses can be horribly unpredictable," Pomfrey finished lamely, almost on the verge of tears.

"_Merlin_, I – he - " McGonagall gaped before regaining her sensibility with a swallow. "Poppy – inform the faculty immediately – if there's anything else that can be done for the Headmaster at a better suited facility, move him to St. Mungo's... if it's as hopeless as you say, treat him as best you can here."

She marched back towards the office, shoving Snape's memory vial into her pocket and fumbling for her Floo Powder.

"_Minerva_!" Poppy screeched from behind her. "_Why am I informing the faculty?_ What shall I say!?"

"Because for the moment I am acting Headmistress – that is, until the aurors and I find Mr. Chow."

* * *

"Fuckin' 'ell, you're as bad as each otha', ya know."

Harry narrowed his eyes, still not looking at Mike.

"Alright, resented, _but," _Taye said jovially, "how in the good fuck are you alive, eh, chinky?"

"Taye – pu' tha fuckin' gun down."

"Oh, no," Taye replied, laughing slightly. "You've got maybe three of four more questions before the gun gets lowered, brau."

"Fuckin' A," Mike growled. "I'm alive, as I said, 'cos the portkey the old woman gave me for _you_, Shujin, stayed in my 'and when I saw ya weren' there. Speakin' o' which – I'm jus' as fuckin' surprised to see you walkin' about, mate."

Finally, Harry turned to him – he looked absolutely terrible.

"Don't say anything yet, Mike," Harry said, stalling him. "What books did you buy me the other day?"

"You wha'?"

Harry stared at him blankly.

"Uh – the tattoin' ones yer mean?"

Harry nodded, frowning, thinking.

"Ok," he said. "When did you buy the bird?"

"The - ? Mar? Uhm... few days 'fore I gave it to ya..."

"Which was when?" Harry pressed, daring to hope.

"Fuck, Shujin – don' remember tha date, mate, but i' was when I dropped ya off fer school."

Harry nodded, relieved.

"Thank fuck," he said bluntly. "Taye, it's him."

The South African, his latex face left in tatters, had not yet cooled towards Harry.

"It's him?" he echoed, before inhaling deeply. "It's _him?_ Are you fucking mad, you little bastard? I know it's fucking him, brau, of course it's fucking him- I'm not a fucking idiot, eh? Its Mike Fucking Chow eh, no problem, we all go back and sit dandy, eh? No - _fuck you_, you chinky cunt and you miniature fucking psychopath, it's not all great! Eh, Mike? Tell me, is it all great, eh? Or should I ask you why you're fuckin' about with Marksmen, eh brau? _How about that_? Maybe I should ask a question or two about who the fuck this little bastard is, eh? Comes in here, in on it all,_ tryin' to run the fuckin' show_, eh?"

For a few seconds after Taye had finished, there was silence.

"Taye – put the gun away, mate?" Mike asked delicately. "Wha' the fuck you doin' wiv a fuckin' piece anyway? Wizards don' carry guns, do they, ya daft cunt? Not 'less they're Shujin."

Harry shrugged as the attention was suddenly on him again. He was still eyeing Taye's outstretched pistol, silencer swaying in time with the irate South African's breathing.

"Oh – fuck, I forgo' 'n' all..."

Mike held out a burnt, charred bundle to Harry who took it without hesitation – sure enough and to Harry's immense relief, within it was his wand (blackened and warped from the explosion) and his shrunken trunk.

"I didn't think I'd get these back," Harry said honestly, in a moment of sad reflection. "Bloody hell. I'm pissed off about Nobunaga's sword. The Marksmen are definitely getting higher on my to-do list."

Taye's attention had been caught, Harry then noticed, making eye contact with him.

"Whose sword?" the South African asked delicately after a moment, looking from him to Mike. "I know you didn't just say Nobunaga, brau..."

"Er yeah, he did," Mike said gently. "He knew him – recently. After... after everything."

"Well anyway - thank you, Mike," Harry said quietly, cleaning off his wand and eyeing Taye silently, wishing he had the magical strength to wipe him out of existence.

"S'alright. Was also kinda hopin' the keys a' still in tha trunk, mate," Mike said, and then suddenly snorted a laugh. "Oh yeah – when I came to, righ', Dumbledore's sittin' huddled ova' it, tryin' ta figure it ou', and 'e's so absorbed in i' he don' notice me grab yer wand – I actually got a fuckin' curse off 'n' all before 'e realised i was there!"

In a second, everything had gone quiet.

"What?" Harry asked faintly, staring at his trunk, blood pulsing through his eyelids. "He was fiddling with it?"

At almost the same time, Taye asked, "You duelled Dumbledore?"

Mike looked between them.

"Er – yeah..?" he said, frowning. "Wha's tha problem? 'E didn' 'ave it up or nuffin Shujin, an' even if 'e's charmed it 'e ain' gonna be monitorin' nuffin soon, mate."

"You outdueled Dumbledore?" Taye asked again, frowning. "Uh – how?"

"Wha' d'ya mean, 'how'? 'Ow d'you fuckin' think, Taye?" Mike said, sounding genuinely confused. "'E's just anotha' wizard, mate. An' despi' wha' everyone seems ta fink, I ain' actually too bad meself."

_Something isn't right, _Harry knew, still staring at the trunk in his hand. _Dumbledore wouldn't lose to Mike Chow. Not unless it was..._

"Christ," Harry said. "It was – he – _fuck_."

The others stared at him. Taye finally lowered the gun.

"It was deliberate," the Malfoy figure finished slowly.

"Er – well, it wasn'..." Mike said, looking at Shujin. "Swear t'ya, mate. I caught 'im by surprise."

Harry was still looking at the trunk, and lowered his wand to it, casting a weak detection charm as best he could.

It didn't show any signs of tampering.

Frowning, already feeling the effects of just that small piece of magic, he tapped it and it enlarged.

"I – it isn't you Mike," he said. "And no offense to you. I saw you in the restaurant. I know you're capable – I'm just confused. He's far too devious... I would have felt it if he did anything directly to it, though..."

Taye wasn't quite so generous in his estimation.

"And yet, you're still you, Mike, eh?" the South African said shortly. "And we have to assume the old savage knows exactly what he's doing – and maybe exactly what we're doing."

Mike was frowning now.

"Ya think 'e let me win," he said quietly, looking almost upset. "Bollocks. Was well 'appy wiv meself 'n' all. Ah well – if 'e did, 'e'll be regretting it tomorrow. Hit 'im wiv a righ' nasty curse 'n' then a good stunner- 'e dropped like a sack o' shit."

Harry tapped out a combination to his trunk and it popped open. Reaching in, he drew out the Gringotts keys.

"I think we need to move quickly," he said quietly. "Taye, you have half an hour to get yourself ready again."

The South African would have loved to argue, insult and question some more, but understood the urgency and, fortunately for Harry, was overconfident in his own abilities and more driven by greed than anything else.

"Alright," he said, before turning to Mike. "You're going to help me, and while you do, we're going to have a little chat about our old organisation, eh?"

"Righ' – you not wan' a drink?" Mike asked, suddenly puzzled. "You ain' worked sober i' thir'y years."

Taye eyed Harry, who was routing through his trunk, ignoring them.

Lacking a response, Mike got up and went to the door.

"Well _I_ need a fuckin' firewhisky."

* * *

"Alright – you all know what we're doing. Standard two-by-two tactical sweep and clear – in, secure and through, ladies and gentlemen," the Auror was saying. "I want you to do me proud in front of Deputy Headmistress McGonagall."

McGonagall stood, impatient, waiting for this pointless introduction to be over. She remembered Tristan Rean (now Auror Captain Tristan Rean) from his years under her wing – a Gryffindor, yes, but a natural procrastinator and, despite his skill in Charms and Defence Against the Dark Arts, born for a lifelong career in bureaucracy. Now just shy of 50 and losing his hair, he considered the fact he was removing himself from behind his desk and leading the team going after Chow a personal favour to McGonagall.

"Now – you all know Albus Dumbledore. Headmaster, Professor, Charmsfellow, et cetera. Most of you were at school under him. The man we're after is responsible for hospitalising him. This is an exceptionally important mission and we're under strict instruction to keep it _low _profile," Rean added with a wink.

"Right," McGonagall said loudly, cutting over him as he took a breath. "Thank you very much, Tristan. I think it's time to go. Everyone remember this man might be armed with muggle weaponry as well as magic, so be extra careful – he is also crucial to the Headmaster's recovery. Right."

She turned to Rean, who was smiling as beatifically at her and the team as he would were he at a press conference.

"Yes – well," he said as he clapped his hands together. "Yes. Shall we? You two first, I think."

The first two disappeared through the ready flames together. They were unnecessarily at the large, one-way fireplace in the Department of Magical Transportation and were beginning to draw a crowd as the second pair of aurors lined up, wands at the ready.

The flames stayed green for them and even after the second pair was through and the next two lined up, the programmed echo destination (the address a private fireplace in London) kept the tall flames green

Unable to contain herself any longer, McGonagall huffed "Oh, for goodness' sake," and marched through the fire.

She felt her feet leave the ground and held herself still for the simulated, magical sensation of flying, whooshing past light fireplaces in the dark Floo Tunnel until...

A few moments later she whooshed out of a fireplace and assumed a combat position...

...in the Atrium.

It took a moment to register – the crowds of commuters, the puzzled official beckoning them out of the way of the fireplaces, the aurors standing to one side looking uncertain, and finally the huge, garish fountain...

She didn't wait for Rean – she didn't need to.

_I should have guessed_, she told herself furiously. _I should have thought of this._

She walked straight up to the face of the puzzled fireplace attendant.

"Uh – uh," the official stammered, avoiding her gaze and remembering his training. "Can – can we m - move it along, p – please, people..."

"Hello Roger," she said as cheerfully as she could muster.

His head lowered as he said, "H – hello, Professor M – McGonagall..."

"Oh, dear, Roger- still stammering?" she tutted. "You used to despise reading for me in class – such a shame. You've a lovely voice when you want to."

He didn't respond, looking bashful. Behind her, she heard Rean enter the Atrium through the fireplace with much gusto and loud enthusiasm.

"Tell me, Roger," she said in a less-grandmotherly-and-distinctly-more-teacherly way. "Can we track those who come through and leave again, hmm? Through these fireplaces here?"

"Um – only the last hundred or so, Professor," he said hopefully, somehow withholding his stutter. "For the last twenty minutes maybe..."

McGonagall closed her eyes and begged the Gods' patience, knowing that Rean's unnecessary involvement had cost her at least thirty minutes.

For a moment, ignoring the world around her, she stood thinking furiously. Suddenly, struck with inspiration, she marched towards the lift at the other end of the Atrium.

A few of the aurors followed her whilst Tristan Rean was busy questioning Roger the fireplace attendant, who had mysteriously regained his stutter.

* * *

"I've only just noticed your hand," Harry said. "Another finger's gone."

Mike looked and nodded.

"Hogwar's finest didn' see no need ta fix me up fully, methinks," he said with a crooked grin. "Think me tattoin' days'll be over now, eh. Los' one-too-many fingers ah reckon."

Harry shook his head, trying not to grin, but grateful for a distraction to take his mind off of what they were going into. He'd been trying for one since they'd set off but as yet he'd had no luck;

"Mike – you seen Mar at all?" he asked hesitantly.

The Asian man shook his head, looking concerned.

"I can't get a response from him," Harry said quietly, worried.

There was silence for a short time, with little more to say to that. The journey seemed to be taking an age.

"So wha' happened to ya, Shujin?" Mike asked quietly now that they were alone. "When I saw you'd gone – an' tha vampire..."

Harry sat back and tried to get comfortable.

"I was bitten," he said after a moment.

Mike's face drained of colour.

"Ended up in Poland though," Harry said, shrugging. "They were pretty quick to drain all the shit out of me and apparently all is well."

Mike was silent, staring at him in horror, for almost a full minute.

"Fuck," Mike eventually said. "'N' ya go' out o' magical Polan' alive? S'well as survivin' bein' blown ta pieces 'n' all tha' shit? An' bitten?"

Harry gave a half-shrug, half-nod in response. Mike shook his head in awe.

"Bea's my story mate," he said. "_Fuck_."

* * *

Saevus felt better.

He'd fed.

But something else had happened – something that would once more distract him...

His brother walked out of the Leaky Cauldron into Diagon Alley.

And, even worse, Saevus now could not smell the boy at all... since feeding, and because the sun was starting to peak at odd moments through the clouds, itching and irritating and threatening, his power was decreasing – his smell sense was fading, clouded by too many distractions.

Baring his teeth, freshly polished, he tutted, feeling far more human now than was comfortable.

Even without his sense of smell, however, he recognised his brother by mere sight alone.

Definitely Lucius.

Walking purposefully..?

_Where to?_ Saevus wondered silently. He began to Will him; _Look over. Look over at me, Lucius._

He tried as much as he might, using his vampiric prowess and his family connection, but apparently he was weaker than he imagined.

He looked from the shadows up the road to where Lucius was headed. In one hand he held a new cane – _a Christmas present? How lovely... – _and in the other he held a small, cuboid shape close to his chest like a box.

_Perhaps a bountiful Christmas indeed, Lucius, _Saevus thought, licking his lips, thinking of his own long-overdue present, all wrapped up in frivolities and silk at Malfoy Manor...

_Narcissa..._

Saevus grinned malevolently, feeling a little less human and a little more powerful now.

He directed his intent and Will against his sister-in-law, and moved away from the sunlight into the shadows of Knockturn Alley, before apparating 'home'.


	26. The Unusual Rain

_G'day._

_Been working hard on starting my own company, and working hard has made me sick as a dog._

_I apologise for the quality of the last chapter and in advance for the poor quality of this one. This is by far the hardest chapter I've ever had to right of anything. What with the content I needed to get through and being ill, it hasn't come up half as well as it could have done, but still – I hope you enjoy it anyway if you can put up with it. I will remedy my style and repost as soon as possible. Oh – and pneumonia for the lose._

_Cheers for the reviews - I did laugh when someone complained there was **too much **plot. As Mike would say- Fuckin' A.  
_

_ I'll see you all soon. Peace,_

_G.L.

* * *

  
_

"So far all is well," Taye said quietly, with a stiff, higher-class British accent.

Had anyone been looking at him, they'd have seen Lucius Malfoy muttering apparently to himself, casting his eyes around a little furtively, however...

This was not so.

Inside the largest compartment in the newly purchased magically shrunken trunk, Harry and Mike sat, rocking sharply every so often, on conjured chairs. _MacReedy's Travel Accessories_ had even given him a discount, just for being 'Mr. Lucius Malfoy, sir'.

Taye lowered the trunk from his chest, surveying the Main Hall of the Wizarding bank, Gringotts.

_Crazy fucking idea, _Taye's head screamed, and he'd be sweating if the latex compound he'd applied to his face allowed it. His heart was beating at a rate of knots, and maddening thoughts rushed through his head as every instinct told him to turn and flee but, on the exterior, Lucius Malfoy walked calmly and a little impatiently towards one of the higher-ranking tellers at the other end.

_Some little genius, _Taye thought petulantly. _Great idea, eh – you two hide in the trunk, I'll be out here on my own, you can hear me but I'm fucked if I can hear you. Fucking wizards._

Invisibly steeling himself as he approached the youngest-looking, Taye hefted up the cane and knocked the solid-silver handle on the desk in front of the Teller.

"You, creature," he said briskly. "I have business on behalf of the Board of Governors and Hogwarts."

The goblin eyed him curiously.

"This to do with Dumbledore bein' out of commission, Mr. Malfoy?" he asked.

Taye nodded, rolling his eyes, inside thinking _Jesus – Mike was tellin' the truth..._

"Yes – news travels fast, hmm?" Taye said disapprovingly, an eyebrow arched. "I also need to make a deposit into a private vault on _behalf _of Professor Dumbledore, and a withdrawal from a private vault on behalf of a silent party. I will need an escort, and then privacy."

This was it – crunch time. The goblin would bite, or he would know something was wrong. The boy, Shujin, seemed to believe they hated Dumbledore and, with the recent turn of events, decided to capitalise on the fact.

The goblin sat back in his raised chair and gave the equivalent of a sniff.

"I need to see your permission and your keys," the goblin said slowly, fortunately not sounding as though any of this was out of the ordinary.

"The letter from the silent party – it has some goblin name or other on it, I believe," he said reaching into his robes. "Professor Dumbledore _intended _to send his permission with that oaf, Hagrid or Heart-grad or whatever his name is, and I'm here on behalf of them both, to ensure that for once, something is done correctly."

The Goblin Teller looked at the little sealed scroll – the name on it was Bite-Helm, in Harry's handwriting. The Goblin's scaly eyebrows rose.

Taye dropped the four keys on the desk between them.

_Timing is crucial_, he told himself. _Time it right and watch it unfold. They are not stupid creatures._

The goblin stared at the scroll, then at the disguised Taye, and finally at the keys.

"Of course. Walk back with me, Mr. Malfoy," the goblin said quietly, clambering down all of a sudden. "We'll find a private room and I shall find the Malfoy Vault Keeper, Bite-Helm, for you."

"No," Taye said impatiently, hand gripping the cane head tightly to stop himself from shaking. "I have other business to attend to this afternoon. Make sure that gets to whoever it's supposed to, and summon someone to see me down. Now."

Looking bewildered, the goblin did so.

* * *

Minerva McGonagall was on the hunt.

She'd visited the archives for records on Chow, and found out about his shady studio, and the accommodation above it.

She'd also found out about his history with the Marksmen.

In less than half an hour, she'd found the place and was now walking up to the entrance of it.

It was bitterly cold in the black-stone Knockholt Square, and not many people were out, everyone prolonging their Christmas break as much as they could get away with.

Marching solidly over the near-empty plaza, up to the front door, she waved her wand in a complex twizzle and the door clicked open silently.

She did not break stride as she marched into the shop.

When she reached the counter she stopped. Peering around with a sniff, she gathered herself together.

_Dark and dingy_, she registered. _Unused for maybe a week_?

"_Lumos," _she whispered, her wand tip igniting with brilliant light.

She moved around inside the parlour slowly, taking in all she could gather, before finding a door in the back studio.

Steeling herself, she performed the same complex wand manoeuvre to open it silently.

_A hallway, _she saw instantly. _Again, dark, but not unused._

Looking to the left inside it she saw a door leading to the Square. To the right were stairs, and another doorway on the opposite side of the hall just before the staircase.

She moved onwards, up the two flights of stairs and into another hallway, at the end of which a dull, dusty window let in a trickle of natural light.

Extinguishing her wand, adjusting her eyes in the gloom, she tapped the tip of her wand against her glasses.

Moving towards the door she could now see on the left-hand side – the one that led to above Chow's studio – she put her free hand on it.

Something caught her attention – a thick doormat in front of the door itself. Her foot was on it. She moved her foot off to read what it said; emblazoned across it was a yellow smiley face, the words wreathing it proclaiming 'FUCK OFF.'

Pursing her lips, she moved her attention back to the door... as it opened.

* * *

Taye stepped carefully into the cart, and for once was not hiding his nerves.

"Where to?" a large, burlier goblin asked, facing forwards like a soldier.

"Uh..." Taye thought for a second. "1188, then 687, then 72, and finally 613."

"You have all the keys?"

"Of course," Taye snapped, sounding a little more like a Malfoy now.

"Hold on," the goblin said with a devilish grin. "First stop – Gringotts' Setup vault for Mr. H. Potter. I assume you are authorised, Mr. Malfoy?"

Taye glared at him, asking from behind his teeth, "Am I sitting here?"

The goblin gave an ill-natured nod and pulled the lever, lurching the two of them into rushing darkness.

"Uh - Mr. Bite-Helm, sir," a young voice asked. "A letter, sir."

The Goblin's eyes rose from the pile of rotting carcasses he was devouring and settled squarely on the young Goblin.

"_A letter?"_ he asked sourly, in Gobbledegook. "_You would interrupt my meal for a letter? What is your name and rank?"_

"_Uh – sir, my apologies and please forgive me, but the Malfoy asked it be sent straight to you. He is here in the bank now."_

With a small growl, Bite-Helm pushed the putrid mess away from him with a single sweep of his short arm and stepped down from the Eating Stool.

"_He is here? The Elder Malfoy?" _the goblin spat, tiny shreds of ancient meat escaping his sharp teeth as he snatched the letter from the other goblin's fist. "_Why has he not been brought to me?"_

"_Sir,"_ the younger goblin said, bowing out of his way and following swiftly, "_he demanded to go into the vaults himself – said he was here on behalf of the Board of Governors and Hogwarts, because the Headmaster is in a coma."_

"_Wait," _the older goblin hissed, circling suddenly. "_The Elder Malfoy is going down into the vaults? Physically going down with an escort, not waiting somewhere and telling us what he wants brought to him?"_

The younger goblin nodded, trying to avoid eye-contact with Bite-Helm.

"_He – he's already inside, sir."_

Bite-helm stood still for a moment, putting things together in his small, scaly head.

For lack of a more appropriate action, he lowered his eyes to the letter in his hand. Pursing his stiff lips with disinterest, he broke the seal and unravelled the creased parchment.

'_Bite-Helm_,' it read. '_I apologise for the confusion and for not appearing in person – I know you have had dealings with the Malfoys in the past and Lucius, despite our differences and with the promise of an owed favour, has agreed to deliver this to you. His business with the bank and my own have in common their secrecy – I didn't dare trust such a letter to owl, but know this; I suspect that Dumbledore is not really in a coma. He is looking for me, for he knows I have escaped Hogwarts' grasp for the holidays and greatly desires to have me back. You have so far been entirely correct about the Headmaster in every estimation... thus; I am in hiding, and forced to do my dealings through those whom no-one would suspect any connection. However, do not worry – when term starts once more I will return in good graces, and our plan will go ahead as intended. As to Lucius Malfoy's dealings here – he does not know my suspicions about Dumbledore, and is here (I believe) purely to capitalise on the Headmaster's misfortune. Let me assure you though, with all formality – Lucius Malfoy, on the 26__th__ December in the early afternoon, has every right to step into the vault you set up for me and deposit or withdraw what he will... after all, the Headmaster will find it most trying, should he decide to, to refund all of the money in my 687 vault if only a fraction of it is still there. I hope you are on the same page as I am, Bite-helm; my many regards – Harry Potter.'_

He read and reread the letter, teeth bared, his mind working frantically.

He stared upwards into the apex of the circular chamber, crushing the parchment in his fists and breathing steadily.

"_Something is going very wrong," _he said out loud.

"_Shall I call the guards, sir?" _the young goblin asked hopefully.

Bite-Helm had forgotten he was there – he turned to admonish him when a thought struck him like a bolt of lightning.

His eyes widened.

_If Dumbledore is inoperative to the public eye, _he considered, _whether it is true and especially if it is not, the Board of Governors with Clause 14 have the right to send a representative to reorganise the Hogwarts funds and withdraw a limited amount from the School vaults. The Board of Governors also have the right to act as the Headmaster for items that are crucially important to the state or safety of the school._

He hummed tunelessly, working his throat, as he took himself through it.

_But, _he thought. _But something is not right about Lucius acting on behalf of Harry... it is illegal unless Malfoy is in Harry's employ... so he must be in someone's employ..._

He frowned deeply, casting the letter away and leaning against a pillar in the chamber, trying to reach a sensible conclusion.

_Well anyway, Malfoy would not simply march down into the vaults unless something truly important was afoot. But what could that be? And is he working on behalf of Dumbledore or –_

He stopped the train of thought short, suddenly knowing, suddenly scowling furiously as he figured it out.

_It's the Stone,_ the conclusion almost slapped him in the face. _It's the stone – the Philosopher's Stone. He thinks Dumbledore is compromised and is moving it to a safer location... or at least that is what he's told the Board of Governors. But he has been the servant of Voldemort in the past, and we know that Voldemort or at least Voldemort's minions are looking to secure the stone to resurrect Him, after that break-in on the first of September. So he's taking the stone down there to... to what? Hide it? Destroy it? Or... leave it somewhere he knows Voldemort will be able to reach it..._

He almost shivered at the implications.

Despite what many believed, Goblins were not inherently evil – they were greedy and very good at getting their own way, but ultimately, they wanted little to do with the rest of the world, and certainly not dominion over it.

Ultimately they were interested in Business – in the economic advantages you hold when you control the funds of nearly every Wizard and Witch in the country.

In the last wizard war, business had declined in an irreparable way – combined with the deaths, the emigration and the panic, people had assumed, through a few very ill-advised marketing ideas and the way they'd chosen to stay neutral, that Goblin-kind automatically allied themselves with Voldemort.

While strictly untrue, a very few had, and as the rumour grew it was very bad for business. The Goblins would never ally themselves with one such as Voldemort – namely, a Wizard – unless there was an absolute, assured certainty that he would win the war.

It had taken years to bridge the void after that... people – humans - do not forget, even if something has been proved to be false.

_So, _he finished in his head, _if it gets out that under the goblins' very noses one of Voldemort's ex-comrades has given him a tool to help him resurrect himself, especially if Dumbledore isn't actually inoperative, things are going to look very, very bad for business._

He ignited the parchment with his hand and held onto it, ensuring it burnt thoroughly, watching and waiting silently, not feeling the flames.

When he held nought but ash, he turned to the younger goblin.

"_Allow the Malfoy into the vault on behalf of the silent partner," _Bite-Helm said in sharp Gobbledegook. "_Let him complete his business there_. _Do not allow him access to the school vaults on behalf of Dumbledore or the School Board and let him know I am available to reason with if he so desires. If he reacts badly to my restrictions, do not hesitate to use lethal force."

* * *

  
_

McGonagall's eyes were stung slightly by the bright orange light that flooded out of the flat as the door swung away from her face.

Standing stock still, taken completely by surprise, she and the tall black man on the other side of it stared at each other in shock.

_I recognise him, _she thought vaguely. _From the restaurant..?_

A split instance later the man began to fumble for his weapon, and she raised her wand and pointed it into his chest, stunning him silently, point-blank, in a flash of red.

He was propelled backwards and his arms splayed out – to her surprise, a wand slipped from his fingers and clattered away, not a handgun.

_Oh dear, _was all she thought as his Ring-eyed comrade from the next room bundled in.

This one was definitely wielding a gun.

A few seconds later and the lightning-fast firefight was ended – she was unharmed, thanking Merlin for his mercy, and the man was face down on the floor, gun still in his fingers, petrified.

She brushed some of the splinters from her shoulder from where the first shot had landed in the doorframe, and lowered her wand.

It was at that point that she felt something cold and hard press into the small of her back, and felt breath on the back of her neck.

A thickly accented voice; "Don't move, old witch – don't you fucking move an inch."

* * *

Taye stepped into the first vault, yawning and glancing over his shoulder, making sure that he was alone.

The goblin had stayed in the cart and was puffing away on a pipe in his own little world.

Breathing deeply, gathering himself together and focusing on the task at hand despite how queasy he felt after the cart ride, he got to his knees in front of the pile of gold and silver and lowered the trunk, still somehow in his hand, to the floor.

Tapping the wand he'd borrowed from Mike on the new trunk, which enlarged, and then once more on the lock, it popped open and the man and boy began to climb out.

Taye once more checked the doorway to the vault.

He gave the All-Clear sign and, in silence, Taye and Mike began to physically push piles of gold towards where Harry was enlarging and opening a combination to his own trunk on the floor in front of him.

One by one, from the smallest to the largest, they filled Harry's trunk's compartments – they'd only filled 5 or so when Harry gave the sign to stop – they'd taken about half of what was in the vault.

Silently again, they compacted the first trunk with the gold in, climbed into the second trunk and Taye closed the top of it gently.

It locked automatically, he tapped it to shrink it once more, and then picked it up.

Moving out of the vault, he felt a little better... or did at least until the cart set off once more.

* * *

"That wen' smoothly," Mike whispered to Harry, back inside the trunk now. They'd conjured some apparently rollercoaster-style seatbelts fixed onto their sofas and Mike had performed a permanent sticking charm with Harry's wand that held the sofas to the floor, so that they could relax on the turbulent cart rides.

Shujin shrugged – he was chain-smoking. Mike had refused any cigarettes, saying that he'd end up coughing his lungs up, which the goblin was bound to hear.

"We're makin' good time bro," Mike went on. "Won' be lon' now."

"That's because we haven't actually broken the law yet," Harry whispered back, annoyed that Mike was more nervous than he was. "I'm making legal withdrawals from my own vaults at the moment."

"Aye – I bet tha goblins'll look at i' that way 'n' all, mate."

Shujin rolled his eyes. Mike had been fine in the planning stages but now, in the act, seemed to be losing his bottle a little.

_Ah, give him a break, Shujin, _Harry told himself. _He nearly died two days ago. Other people aren't as good at coming back from that as you are._

A few more seconds passed in rocky, bumpy silence before Mike whispered loudly, "Think I will grab one o' them ciggys now, cheers, mate."

* * *

"So my dear," the accented man said gruffly. "Why don't you tell me who you are?"

McGonagall's wrists hurt. Her wand was on the table on the other side of the room – she'd been forced, at gunpoint, to _enervate _the black man and had needed to assure her captor that the other man's petrification would wear off slowly.

Now she was wandless and tied to a chair in the middle of Mike Chow's flat.

"My name," she stated bluntly, "is Professor Minerva McGonagall."

"Ooh – a Professor, eh?" he said with a grin, his 'R's thick, looking behind her at his companion.

The unmarked black man had sat behind her and, from enervation, had avoided her eye. She was growing more and more suspicious of his identity – coupled with the fact that he was apparently a wizard, and yet in the employ of the Marksmen.

"I am here on behalf of Professor Albus Dumbledore," she continued. "Who I'm sure the man behind me at least will have heard of."

The man in front of her, pointing the gun lazily from his perch on the windowsill, said, "We all know Dumbledore, my dear..."

"Good," she replied. "In that case, I think it is time you let me go, hmm?"

"Oh _do _you? And why would we do that?"

"Because I'm not here to impede on your business at all – I'm looking for Michael Chow, and I was informed that this was his last known address."

The man grinned wider.

"Why – we were looking for Chow ourselves, ma'am," he said mockingly. "What a fortunate coincidence, _nyet_?"

She fought back a shudder.

"It would appear so," she said crisply. "Now, as I have not permanently harmed either of your companions, and have no business or qualms with you or your men, it would be courteous to untie me, give me back my wand and let me go about my day."

The man in front of her creased with cackling laughter and Minerva began to feel very scared – not the first time a cruel, simple Muggle had induced such an effect.

"I fail to see the funny side," she said, her voice heroically steady.

"Ah – ah," the man said, wiping his red-ringed eye. "You will do. In years to come. Now then – ah, here's an idea! Why don't we stop this _bazár_ and tell me what you know about Chow?"

She pursed her lips, her heart thumping.

"I think I already have," she said.

The man shook his head, standing up from the windowsill, walking towards her leisurely, completely at ease.

"_Tuftá_ - I think you could tell me a little more, _bljad'_" he said pleasantly.

She noticed that, as he got angrier, more and more of what she assumed was Russian slipped out.

"Such as?"

"Where is the _shíshka_, Chow?" he asked in a low voice, no longer with pretense.

She sighed and said, "I have no idea."

"_Chush' sobách'ya_," he scowled. "Let us try again."

By the time ten minutes had passed, her old face was bruised and battered, her chair was ten feet closer to the window and he wasn't speaking any English at all.

* * *

Lucius Malfoy, Snr., at their head, the Aurors marched into the bank with their wands out.

Before anyone could say anything, the young goblin teller near the other end of the Atrium screamed at the top of his lungs.

_"CLOSE THE BANK! Imposters! We're being ROBBED!"_

* * *

Harry held up a hand and snapped his fingers.

The other two looked up – they were in the Hogwarts main vault, a huge, cavernous chamber with three security doors, the last of which had needed the Key.

Taye looked at him questioningly but soon heard it - the sound of another cart arriving. Mike was facing the door already.

Harsh, low words were exchanged in the goblin language from the carts – it sounded like maybe ten or so goblins were out there.

Harry closed his eyes.

_Fuck, _he thought.

He gave the clear-out signal immediately, knowing something had gone wrong somehow in an otherwise perfect plan.

Using what little Art he could get away with, he pushed the rest of the nearest pile of coins and artefacts into the open trunk compartment. He started trying to hurry the others but realised it was too late.

_Shit – how the fuck do we get out of this one? _He wondered, trying to make his brain work.

Without preamble, at the sound of goblins at the first door, Mike jumped into the new trunk on the other side and pulled the lid shut.

Taye hissed a curseword after him but Harry knew he'd done the right thing – he waved at Taye to get his attention.

"Grab this trunk," he whispered as loud and quick as he dared. "When I'm in it – hide it in your robes – maintain your cover!"

With that, he jumped into the open compartment and landed heavily on the massive pile of gold and trinkets with a grunt.

His brain wasn't yet working – he was trying to think of what could have gone wrong.

_Is the situation salvageable?_ He wondered hopelessly. He'd never fought goblins...

The trunk lid thudded shut and he prayed that somehow they'd escape – Taye had his and Mike's wands. His own wand was needed to open the trunk he was in.

He heard the tap to shrink it and felt himself lifted hurriedly up and into the pocket of the robes.

_I should have thought this through, _he realised. _What the fuck happened? We got through the waterfall alright, it didn't remove the muggle-made disguise... we were already in the fucking vault!_

They'd assumed that after they were in the school vaults already that nothing would go wrong – they were plain sailing from there... they'd already stolen millions without being noticed in their very simple plot... but apparently something had gone very wrong.

_And we were only one fucking vault from getting away with it!_

At the sound of raised voices outside the trunk Harry subconsciously held his breath, wondering what the hell would happen to them if Taye didn't pull this off.

Apparently, they didn't give him the chance to.

He heard the South African scream and fall – Harry rolled awkwardly on the pile of gold, almost drowning in the tide of coins, and he felt something sharp cut his ankle as Taye fell with the trunk in his pocket.

_Shit almighty, _Harry thought, not daring to pull himself out of the heavy, cold swamp.

Taye's scream was cut off.

The goblins kept shouting in their language – from what Harry could hear they were ensuring that the job was finished, sticking Taye continuously with... with what? With the huge decorative spears the guards in the atrium hold?

The voices rose in angry chorus as, presumably, Taye's very simple muggle disguise was ripped from his corpse.

_Fuck it all, _Harry thought in frustration. _I shouldn't have got in the trunk. I should have killed the little fucks._

He wondered briefly if Mike was alright.

...then he felt the trunk he was in lift off of the floor – he heard a goblin's voice very close indeed.

_They've found me, _he thought. _They've found my fucking gold._

Despairing, not knowing what else he could possibly do, he closed his eyes and concentrated, hard, on disappearing...

His Art would not come. He didn't have the power.

With a groan of frustration, the pitch black compartment full of gold starting to slowly crush him, he tried to let a spike of _something _ignite his Art...

_Panic? Despair? Anger?_ He wondered in quick succession. _Why won't anything fucking come?_

The goblins were starting to pry at the case – he could feel it, with his connection to the exterior of it...

Suddenly, Harry had it. He felt a dull flourish of hatred for the greed and deception of the fucking goblins – for Dumbledore, lying unconscious in Hogwarts – he felt hatred for the whole wizarding world and everyone in it. Even fucking Mike, who still had told him everything about Nobunaga. Even the stupid, immature students he shared Hogwarts with. The school itself – he hated all of it. Every fucking thing. The deceptive, stupid Weasley twins, the teachers, the location – _pure and unadulterated hatred coursed through him_.

_I hate this whole world, _the breathless mental voice narrated. _THIS WHOLE FUCKING WORLD._

He revelled in it.

_He let it consume him slowly_ – from the smallest trickle onto the surface of his dormant, exhausted Art to the exhilarating rush of loathing that ran like fire through his veins, all of it built into a tremendous force that ran through his body and devoured his soul.

His weary art was not triggered by a spike or a lick of emotion – his emotion grew until it almost destroyed the Art itself, the very core of him.

He felt the magnetism – the electricity in the darkness around him –

_I... am... losing... control..._

He couldn't breath but he didn't need to – the swelling pressure squeezed his body and his spirit until it felt like he would explode –

_I... will..._

The effort almost killed him.

_...disappear._

_

* * *

_

"_Tvoyú mat'_!" the Russian screamed in frustration, spitting in her face.

He had her by the hair and was lifting her, suspending her in the air in front of the window, rubbing her bloody face into the glass which felt like it was straining, desperate to crack and free her from this place.

The other men had left – now it was just the two of them.

McGonagall had closed herself off to the world – it was the only response she could have at this time. She had stayed strong and resilient, then had cried and begged, and now there was nothing else for it – she had told them all she knew and they still intended to kill her.

_At least I will have died trying to help Dumbledore, _she thought, though it was little compensation and she never forgave herself for thinking it.

The Marksman was still screaming at her in Russian but she got the gist of it.

_This is it, _she thought, surprisingly calm. _I lived through the war against muggle-killers and now I'm to die at the hands of muggles._

She hoped that, if she survived, this experience didn't change her too severely.

But she knew she wouldn't survive.

The Russian moved behind her and pressed his body weight into her back – he was no longer screaming.

He intended to end it now – to push an old woman face first through the window, to fall a storey onto cold, black stone.

_Merlin, _she thought as she felt the glass warp slightly and heard a splinter. _I hope there's a Hell for these men._

And then, out of the blue, she felt it...

After a moment, so did the man behind her, trying to murder her. He released his push momentarily.

Silence...

The force of it was like the sonic boom of a tiny nuclear explosion in the room behind them.

Minerva McGonagall was shielded from the blast itself by the Marksman, whose scream was drowned in the force of noise that pushed the two of them laterally through the window and out into the cold air.

Her eardrums had been massacred and she knew she'd broken some bones before she even landed.

But land she did, in a muffled and confusing thump – the force of the explosion behind them had imploded the building and a dustcloud arose slowly and artfully.

She'd landed on the large Russian.

The last thing she saw was gold.

* * *

_This is not a good place_, Harry decided, standing in the wake of his impact.

Incredibly he wasn't yet tired – he felt brilliant. It was the most alive he'd felt in years.

He walked out of the wreckage, feeling his strength start to drain rapidly, and somehow his feet found the Twilight Inn through the gathering crowds.

He ordered a room as though in a dream and somehow found it... he didn't reach the bed before collapsing.

* * *

He laughed, supping his tea with reverence as she turned away shyly.

"And to whom do I owe thanks for this brew, fair maiden?" he asked playfully.

"Jalila," she responded flirtatiously.

"Ah, Jalila – how exotic," he breathed, thinking, _I love my job_.

They were interrupted by the Producer, whose magically echoed voice shouted, "Martin! One Minute!"

"Aw," he feigned misery. "Gotta go to work now sweetie – but come find me afterwards, yeah?"

She agreed and left the booth – he sighed and turned in his chair.

Looking through the glass to the other side for affirmation, a voice in his ear said 'Thirty Seconds'.

He cleared his throat, with one hand lifting the sheaves of parchment in front of him, and stretching the other over toward the huge magical Gramophone.

His eyes scanned the page as he counted down in his head.

One more sip of his tea, then – the voice in his ear said 'Ten... nine...'

He tuned it out and put his hand on the needle arm, ready to lift as the song finished – he got a nod from the other side of the glass and tapped his the magicrophone with his wand and leant into it as he pulled the needle off of the record.

"That was the _Duel of the Fates_ cover by 'Pepper and the Pixies'... Good evening listeners – you're back with me, Martin Andreas, on the Wet Whistles of Winter special – Happy Boxing Day to all," he said, his voice deep and smooth.

As he talked, the magical record flew itself back onto the shelf and he waved his wand, summoning and preparing the next one.

"Call-ins will start at seven, I remind you," he continued. "And I've got a real treat for you in just a moment – the new Weird Sisters track, exclusive to us on the Wizarding Wireless Network this beautiful Boxing Day – but first, it is six o'clock and these are the day's headlines..."

He cleared his throat and squinted at the first bullet point.

"...Gringotts Bank has had to report its second break-in this year today – the Spokesgoblin for the bank has told our reporters that the occurrence of a second-such event so soon after the first break-in, which you may remember from September, is unprecedented, and we've been told the bank will be stepping up security to meet the calibre of modern criminals when the New Year comes – so, listeners, you may be subjected to far more thorough security checks when visiting your vaults in the future, you've been warned. At this point, all that we know is that the break-in was _un_successful – so fear not; nothing has been removed from the bank – but there was a fight of some sort and at least two men are believed to have been involved. Our source inside the bank, who did not wish to be named, has indicated that there was some sort of struggle, and that there were casualties on both sides, but otherwise nothing has been clarified and no official arrests have been made – at least not by humans, anyway," Martin added mysteriously, imagining the look on his producer's face. "In other news – in what is being treated as an unrelated incident, at around the same time as the break-in, there was some sort of _explosion _in Knockholt Square today, which for those who don't know is the _shadier _neighbour to Diagon Alley in Central London. Two people were injured and rumours are abound that one of those people was none other than a teacher from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry! Far more extravagant and unbelievable, however, are the two-hundred witness reports and statements that have proclaimed that _millions _in golden Galleons were projected from the blast and landed, in an inexplicable hail of pure gold, all over Knockholt Square and even into Knockturn Alley itself! Was this some strange terrorist attack? Were the two incidents related? What sort of statement is being made? Or was this all just a horrible accident? We all know that there some less-than-orthodox places in the area and strange, public alchemical experiments have been carried out in the past..." he said, when an idea popped into his head and he continued, "and perhaps all this incident has been is a Hogwarts Teacher has managing to create an exploding version of the Philosopher's Stone!"

Smiling giddily to himself, Martin sipped his tea, imagining the reactions of his listeners and his boss.

"Aurors have issued a call for all those who were nearby to hand in the gold that was expunged from the explosion, which tells us that they believe it was _real _gold and not the Leprechaun equivalent, but mysteriously, so far, none has been handed in... well anyway, we wish the Hogwarts teacher and the other person involved a hasty recovery. Now... last night we at the WWN issued a survey about Christmas _Smells_....."


	27. The Light After Sunset

All was silent.

All was still.

Everyone in the crushing crowds moved slowly… peacefully; the flurry of activity slowed to a nothingness as the sky rained gold. People were blinded by it – blind to all else…

But he saw everything. The colours, the noises, the swells, the fury – all of it melted into calmness. And at the heart of the calmness…

He saw a staggering Shujin.

He signalled.

* * *

Chaos.

The Goblin teller who'd first raised the alarm – also the first to have been struck by one of the auror wizards' curses - was lying flat on the ground, scaly face against the cool marble.

His eyes opened and, through the medley of feet both Goblin and human, he saw a man walking towards the exit, otherwise unnoticed, who he wouldn't have expected to see there at that moment in a million years.

He tried to cry out, but could not. His eyes closed and he rested.

But he remembered. It was only a few minutes before another goblin shook him awake with a sneer and he burst out the name of the man who'd just walked out the door, before his eyes were even open, and before he'd got to his feet the goblins had mobilised, the wizards reorganised, and they'd all moved out into the alley.

* * *

Flowers,

she thought. _We need more flowers in here._

She was staring at the ceiling. She had nowhere else to look.

She hadn't cried, or screamed, or even fought back too much – she'd just stared at the ceiling. Its cracks, patterns, and lack of floral activity were now very familiar to her.

It hadn't taken Saevus long to finish. He'd clearly been interested more in the thrill of the chase than the act itself – she wasn't sure if a vampire could even enjoy it – even feel what a human would - in the act. It was more a case of dominance.

But she had felt it.

She didn't try to cover herself – there was little point. She just lay there, staring at the ceiling, detached somewhat from her own consciousness.

_How did I come to be here? _She wondered. _Enacting my worst fears…_

Saevus had arrived at the manor, sweeping in, surprised to find Lucius there with her. He'd mentioned something about seeing Lucius at Gringotts. They'd put two and two together and he'd rushed away – her own husband, rushed away for what was probably a bare-faced lie, leaving her alone with - with… _him_.

And he'd torn at her, sudden in his lust, undressing her on the floor of the drawing room… and he'd taken her.

Or what little she had left of herself.

_Flowers, _she thought blandly.

The doorbell went.

Saevus stood gracefully, nude, an unfinished glass of vintage red wine in his hand. He went to the grand hall, to the door. Narcissa heard him moving delicately across the floorboards.

A female voice at the door.

Narcissa checked her neck slowly. With both hands, she ran her fingers over her ivory skin.

_No bites._

Muffled conversation in Saevus' harmonious tones and this strange woman's.

"I'm on my way," she heard him say.

He walked back into the room, light on his feet, and laid the glass down on the table near her.

"Someone's found the mark," he remarked gently. "Must dash."

She heard him dress and move to the fireplace. He stated a destination and moved into the fire. For the briefest moment the patterns on the ceiling were cast in a green relief.

Then he was gone.

She lay still for what seemed like an age, listening to the grandfather clock at the top of the stairs. As it ticked gently through the house she merely listened.

After what seemed like an age, she pinched herself on the arm, hard.

Still she couldn't cry.

* * *

"…Aurors have issued a call for all those who were nearby to hand in the gold that was expunged from the explosion, which tells us that they believe it was _real _gold and not the Leprechaun equivalent, but mysteriously, so far, none has been handed in..."

Snape smirked in spite of himself.

"Well anyway," the presenter continued, "we wish the Hogwarts teacher and the other person involved a hasty recovery. Now... last night we at the WWN issued a survey about Christmas _Smells_..."

Catching himself with a stupid smile on his face, he quickly replaced it with a sneer. Poppy insisted on having this drivel on in the background in her office as she bustled about noisily. He surreptitiously flicked his wand towards the wireless, lowering the volume to a blissful murmur.

He stretched gingerly, arms up, wincing at the dull, aching agony that still shot through his midsection.

_Blasted muggle weapons, _he thought with venom. _Some of the more radical pureblood ideals make more sense when you're on the receiving end of the muggles' own treatment._

He peered slowly around, gritting his teeth against the pain. Minerva was at St. Mungos, having been taken there by an 'anonymous' party. She was quite simply on the edge of death, according to the MediWizard who'd called in, who'd also mentioned 'hours of physical torture', which puzzled Severus to no end. Quirrel was conscious – how he was still alive was anyone's guess. He'd been shot in the back of the head and all the turban jokes in the world couldn't account for an expected full recovery.

The ward was desolate and empty with only the unconscious Dumbledore in the cot and the two motionless aurors standing either side of the fireplace. _What on Earth is it with the Potter boy and Hogwarts Staff ending up needing medical attention?_

Snape sneered at the aurors in disgust, but his heart wasn't really in it. He was exhausted, and by rights should be in one of the cots instead of standing vigil. He'd be useless in a duel at this moment anyway. He understood why they were here – this Chow person had _somehow _bested Albus in a duel, leaving the Headmaster comatose, and anyone involved could not help but realise there was more going on here – something else happening behind the scenes, just out of sight.

Suddenly the fireplace turned green – in an instant, the aurors were ready for action, each having taken a step away from the fire and raised their wands at the ready. Snape's brow furrowed, but his wand slipped back into his fingers nonetheless.

For a moment, nothing happened.

"DAWLISH," a voice boomed from the fireplace without warning. "A.S.N.: 00901."

One of the auror guards visibly relaxed a little but the other remained stock still.

"Affirm," the warier of the two barked. "Request?"

"Affirmed – alpha-sierra-november double-zero-nine-zero-one; Dawlish, J," the familiar voice said from the fire. "Request all through, plus one."

"Acknowledged," the same auror said from this side. The other auror didn't hide his relief now, stepping back a little from the fire. "What's up, John?"

"I have the suspect," Dawlish stated bluntly through the fireplace. "Chow, Michael Sung."

Now Snape did sit up properly. The other auror suddenly snapped to attention also. Poppy Pomfrey watched carefully – nervously – from the door to her office.

"Send him through first," the auror said carefully.

"On his way," Dawlish confirmed.

Snape raised his wand, and the aurors readied themselves – one to grab the man, the other to cover from a safer distance.

In a flurry of ash, Mike Chow staggered into the room and into the arms of the waiting auror. He was roughly manhandled over the nearest cot, arms pinioned behind him, looking utterly defeated.

In the blink of an eye the fireplace erupted once more in emerald flames and the not-so-impressive form of John Dawlish stepped out, wand at the ready and a spare in his left hand.

"Where's Rean?" the standby auror asked Dawlish as he brushed himself off.

"Dealing with red tape in his best Gobbledegook," Dawlish said with a sour smile. "Malfoy's still at the bank, absolutely up in arms, rousing the goblins into a fervour."

"What the hell happened?" the same auror asked.

Dawlish shrugged, saying, "Something about an attempt on Gringotts – this idiot went straight from here to there."

"Later," the sterner of the two barked from where he was restraining Chow. "Let's fix the Head first."

Snape was content to watch with a brisk 'hello' nod to Dawlish, who he'd taught NEWT level potions to a few years beforehand. He didn't have the energy to assist.

Within a few moments, the three had bundled Mike Chow into a Full Nelson over Professor Dumbledore. He wasn't resisting but a large show was made of it nonetheless. Poppy, Snape noticed, came to stand nearby, predicting sensibly that some sort of injury would occur to someone – most likely the prone headmaster – in the midst of it all.

"Now, Mr. Chow," the ranking auror hissed. "Reverse the curse."

_They teach rhyming at Auror School, at least, _Snape thought humourlessly.

"I need a wand," Chow grunted, looking defeated. "I didn' wan' ta hurt 'im, f' Merlin's sake – I'll fuckin' reverse it."

Snape flinched as the aurors negotiated a wand into Chow's hand. _This will not end well, _he knew. With an ever increasing feeling of dread, the Potions Master watched as they laboriously explained to the man what would happen if he even _thought _of an incantation other than the counter-curse.

The Asian man nodded. His shoulders showed him sighing. The aurors guided the wand towards the Headmaster's body.

_Oh, Merlin, _Snape thought, starting to rise as he saw Mike Chow's eyes harden.

Without a sound, suddenly the world went white.

The force of the blast knocked the already-injured Snape to the ground, his robes and hair billowing from the floor in the haze. Oddly there was very little sound. Just rustling movement.

"Grab him," one of the aurors grunted through the sheet of white. "Fucking grab him…"

There was a groan and a thud somewhere in the mist.

"I can't fucking see!" Dawlish suddenly screamed in frustration – he sounded very close.

Snape pointed his wand above him – he couldn't even see his arm in front of his face.

"_Evanesco," _he hissed. "_Fi – finite incantatem._"

Nothing happened to clear the dense, pale smoke.

More rustling. Footsteps. A groan.

Silence. Snape waited, useless and exhausted on the infirmary floor, for his fate. He was drained dry in every way – physically, emotionally, magically…

Without warning, a most unexpected voice came out of the silence.

"_DEBILITO!" _Dumbledore roared. "_NUBEDIUS!_"

The whiteness disappeared in a single sweep. Snape's eyes came into focus – the white panelled infirmary suddenly looked very dark and dilapidated after the pure white fog disappeared.

He forced his head up from the floor and saw, like a paragon, Dumbledore off of the bed, standing over Mike Chow, who was incapacitated at his feet. The aurors pulled themselves together and began to move in, grabbing the unconscious Chow and dragging him away.

Dumbledore's expression was one of fury, but then it softened. He looked slowly around. His eyes met Snape's.

He smiled.

"Don't worry, my boy," he said to him. His voice sounded echoey – unreal. "I'm alright."

Snape tried to speak.

It was a smile like the one you'd receive from your grandfather.

"Relax," said Professor Dumbledore. "I have taken care of Michael. Harry is at the Twilight Inn in Knockturn Alley. I need you to take the Aurors over to fetch him_._"

Snape's head rolled back slowly, resting on the floor.

"Ah - and after only a me-?" he heard Dumbledore murmur before cutting himself off. "Poor Severus. In that case perhaps I'd best go myself."

He heard Albus move away, but before Snape's brain could process anything, he suddenly was finding it very hard to remember how he'd ended up on the floor as all recollection of a white fog slipped from his mind.

* * *

Lucius marched doggedly into Knockturn Alley. Witches and Wizards of all shapes and sizes jumped out of his path, for he was trailed by a phalanx of eight goblins in battle dress, armed to the razor-sharp teeth. Halberds of black silver and platemail inlaid with golden runes made for a once-in-a-lifetime sight.

_An Imposter, eh? _He thought furiously. _A thrice-cursed imposter? I'll hex his balls off. I'll transfigure his tendons into piano wire._

It had taken them only half an hour of explaining to make him the angriest wizard in the country, but he was still mildly – _mildly – _grateful that he was, as far as they knew, on their side.

And when the teller had suddenly screamed out who he'd thought he'd saw… well. It was a whole new game of Quidditch, if _He _was involved.

Half way down the alley he paused. A sharp, angry little voice squawked up at him but he ignored it. Immediately ahead of him, he saw Saevus – his own demonic half-brother - being pointed by a Marksman into the Twilight Tavern, a crooked structure in the middle of the alley that split it into a fork. He narrowed his eyes. From the shadows several Marksmen emerged from where they'd lain in wait. They were dressed straightforwardly, in dark _muggle_ suits, a few with black rings around their eyes.

"Our first priority is the gold," the goblin sergeant to his side reminded him.

Lucius bared his teeth angrily, watching as Saevus led the Marksmen towards the Twilight Tavern. He'd heard about the explosion up the road from about an hour ago, and the resulting gold shower… but having since learnt that none of the stolen bullion was _his_, his priorities had shifted slightly.

"It's in there," he said to the sergeant, pointing at the Tavern, "along with the people responsible."

The creature's eyes widened. It barked an order at the phalanx and, as one, they trotted towards the Tavern. Lucius followed in their wake. People peered curiously out from the side streets at the goblin phalanx – it looked almost comical, and the uniform 'chink – chink – chink – chink' it made as their chainmailed legs' quick-march echoed up the street.

He lost sight of Saevus and the muggles. The Goblin phalanx reached the front door.

The goblins poured in through the front into the bar, which took up all of the grey downstairs area. Lucius followed swiftly, his eyes scanning the room they entered, at the gallery on the first floor that overhung the bar area, searching for any sort of sign…

On the other side of the room, almost twenty muggle Marskmen stood, staring dumbly at the goblins. A few wizards accompanied them and stared in confusion. Saevus was nowhere to be seen.

One or two patrons still sat in there, huddled into their pitchers.

Saevus rose from behind the bar, blood down his chin. _Ah, _Lucius thought. _Taking care of the landlord._

Saevus met Lucius' eyes with a flicker of confusion before the man removed his wand. The goblin phalanx was motionless. The muggles waited for someone to make the first move, still transfixed by the little goblin warriors.

"_Avada Kedavra," _Lucius said simply, pointing his wand into the mass of suits. One dropped and the rest erupted, firing in his and the goblins' direction.

Lucius disapparated in the nick of time – two aurors suddenly entered the fray from outside.

* * *

'_Harry.'_

Blackness.

'_Shujin!' _it insisted.

…

Still nothing.

'_Harry James Potter –awake!'_

Slowly – torturously slowly – Harry drifted into the land of the living. He couldn't see anything – he was face down on the covers.

'_What?' _he sent drearily.

'_You must wake.'_

He opened his eyes into the covers once more.

'_Mar?' _he thought, confused. '_Is that you?'_

'_Yes! Yes, it is, Shujin – you must wake!'_

'_I – I am awake… are you ok? Why – why have you been out of contact?'_

'_I will explain later – you must rise! You must escape!' _the bird sent back, the genderless, disembodied voice shrill.

'_Wha – why? What's wrong?' _Harry sent, forcing his body to move slightly. '_Where are you?'_

'_Locked in the Headmaster's office. There's no time to explain. You have to escape – there are wizards on their way to arrest you.'_

After a beat, he was wide awake.

'_Where?' _he thought urgently.

'_Upon you – as we speak -'_

Without wasting another second and despite his body's protestation, he dragged himself off of the bed, trying to get his bearings.

_Gringotts – Mike's – Knockturn – Twilight Tavern – bed._

He didn't dare rub his eyes, in case they didn't reopen, as he moved towards the window that looked down onto the little alley.

At the windowsill he stopped dead. In Knockturn below, two aurors flanked a fiery-looking Albus Dumbledore as they marched towards the Tavern.

_Holy fucking Christ, _he thought. _How the fuck did he find me? Oh – _he winced at his own stupidity. _You told him where you'd be staying, didn't you, stupid._

He made to prepare himself mentally before suddenly his brain clunked into place and he thought, _What the fuck is Albus fucking Dumbledore doing locking up my fucking Raven?_

A shout went up from downstairs. A distinctly inhuman shout. Harry turned slowly from the window, hesitant in his fury and confusion, looking at the faded wood of the door to the rest of the Tavern.

An enormous cracking gunshot, like someone firing off a 14-bore shotgun, erupted from somewhere downstairs and all hell broke loose.

Suddenly, shouts of curses and _battlecries _mixed with gunshots and, in the medley, he heard a familiar vampire shout his name.

"SHUJIN!" the voice crowed through the corridors. "LITTLE SHUJIN… ARE YOU HERE? ARE YOU WAITING FOR ME? I CAN _SMELL_ THE TOBACCO ON YOU…"

His skin crawled and he reflexively went for his sword.

_Oh, wait – no sword, _he remembered, the blackened mess of metal filling his mind's eye. _Oh fucking dear._

Without another moment to waste, he staggered towards the bedside table and snatched up his miniature trunk. He glanced around to see if there was anything else he'd left – _nothing important, _he decided. _Time to go._

He ran at the fireplace of the room and took the last tiny sprinkle of Floo powder from it. _Just enough. _He threw it into the embers and, moving forwards, shouted, "Gryffindor Tower, Hogwarts!" for lack of a better idea.

He ran into the blackened wall of the other side of the fireplace.

He stared for a moment in confusion, stepping backwards, before realising they'd turned off the floo access in the Tavern. _Fucking officials!_

The shouting voices and general cacophony was getting louder – nearer…

_This is bad, _he thought, now out of Floo and too severely drained of magical energy to attempt any other type of escape.

Someone started firing an automatic weapon in the hallway outside his room. Something heavy hit the floor a few doors down. Screaming filled the Tavern around him as ordinary witches and wizards, denizens of Knockturn, took up the fight.

_What the hell do I do now? _He wondered, pulling his Python from its holster. _It's a miracle I'm on my fucking feet._

Click.

Two rounds left.

Cli-click.

_Spares in the trunk, _he processed rapidly. _And where the fuck is my wand?_

The door to the room imploded in a cloud of dust. Harry turned, resigned, levelling the pistol at… a goblin.

For a moment the two stood there – Harry with the gun and the goblin, standing wearily, blood pouring from a wound above its scaly eye socket, in bronze chainmail, gold-engraved platemail and with a black halberd twice as long as Harry pointing into the room.

_Oh, Christ, _he thought as the little beast snarled, suddenly demonic, and pivoted, aiming to drive the spear-point of the Halberd into him.

_BANG!_

The gunshot vibrated the hardwood in the ceiling above him and in the enclosed space the thunderclap reached his ears immediately with none of the customary exterior delay, but to Harry's horror while the slug knocked it off balance, it was obvious the creature would be up, relatively unharmed, in a matter of seconds.

_Tough little fucker, _he though savagely, drawing his dagger and spinning the revolver in his fingers so that he was holding the body and hot barrel with the butt protruding. His thin wrist ached from the recoil.

He lurched forwards and was upon it, stabbing repeatedly at the joints in the armour and battering the helmet and skull with the pistol.

It was rapidly wearing him out, and having very little effect.

With deceptive strength the little creature heaved up Harry's foot with a roar that belied its size and pitched him onto his rear. Without further ado it sunk its razor sharp teeth into his ankle as it scrabbled for its sword.

He grunted in pain and shock and tried desperately to drive his enchanted dagger into its scales, changing angles so as to exploit the joins in its armoured skin.

The fucker bit harder.

He cried out a little and, against his better judgement, allowed himself to slip into his centre.

Despite feeling no pain, and suddenly becoming inhumanly calm, the complete and total depletion of all energy reserves - physical and magical - nearly made him pass out. He had to make a huge conscious effort to drop the dagger, turn the gun around and point it against the under-side of the beast's jaw at the softer flesh of the neck.

He almost – _almost – _didn't have the strength in his hand to thumb the hammer.

He exhaled and squeezed.

At close range, the .357 round in a Python would take the head off of most living things. Even without outright head-removal, the exit wound would be the size of a fist or larger. Harry now learnt, however, that on a goblin, there probably wouldn't be an exit wound at all. The bullet would lodge somewhere, the beast would stop moving, and that would be that.

_Tough as fucking nails, _Harry thought mournfully, knowing the beast wouldn't be alone.

He clambered up, exhausted, reholstering the empty pistol and sheathing the dagger. He wished he had his wand, even if it was just to get into his trunk. He picked up the heavy, glittering black halberd that he'd just nearly be skewered with. It was awkward and unwieldy, and would be difficult in the narrow, crooked corridors of the Tavern. He sighed, dropping it onto the wooden floorboards and removing his dagger once again.

His left, free, hand came up to his shoulder, reaching over the dragon there as he thought, _It's time I got my money's worth from you. _Likewise, he was beginning to hope the runes would have a more outright effect from now on and there was no time like the present for them to start pulling their weight.

He reversed the dagger so that the pommel stuck out between his thumb and forefinger and the blade ran flat along his forearm. He raised his fists experimentally, loosening up, taking every valuable second he had.

Nobunaga – his sensei – had taught him how to do this. And told him never to attempt it. He swayed and had to stop himself falling into the wall. He took a few deep breaths before gritting his teeth.

_This is going to be a bit shit, _he thought as the first victim – a Marksman – ran into the doorway and laid eyes on him.

* * *

Feeling guilty for getting hit with a stray curse and being out of the duel against Chow, Snape had taken a pepper-up or three and recovered his wits enough to assist the headmaster in Potter's retrieval.

He knew he'd regret it later, but it was the least he could do, having felt significantly useless for the past few days and now, when he could be doing something, being expected to just… recover.

He strode from the Apparition point in Diagon Alley and turned immediately into Knockturn, to see to his dismay that people were running away from the heart of it and flooding into Diagon. He stared around, shocked that so many witches and wizards and _more _could crawl out of the woodwork of the less-reputable alley at one time.

He was then shoved out of the way inexplicably by a reinforcement phalanx of twenty goblins, or more, bustling their way down Knockturn against the tide at a trot.

_This is bad, _he thought suddenly. _This is very bad._

He couldn't see the Twilight Tavern from here. He'd never been inside – he'd walked past plenty of times but he tended to shirk spending more time than was necessary in places such as Knockturn Alley and Knockholt Square, and he'd not yet had the need to stay overnight.

He ground his teeth together, deliberating.

Then he caught himself, astonished – _Afraid, Severus? Of a boy? Of… a Potter?_

He set his jaw and marched down the alley, the dregs of wizarding society splitting to give him just enough room to march down.

And then, well before he could see anything, he could _hear _the Tavern. Screams, explosions, and… war cries.

He broke into a run, his face unmasked as he sprinted towards the Tavern – he saw the phalanx of goblins disappear into a hole in the side of the building which Severus was sure had once been a _wall _and the screaming renewed in vigour.

Steeling himself, he glanced around at the nearby stalls, searching for something that triggered recognition – _yes, _he thought victoriously, spotting on a dingy corner the tiny shack of a shop called _Unction Junction_.

He forced his way into the door – nobody was there. _Nobody in their right mind, at least, _he thought. _A couple of goblins on the warpath… in Central London…_

He shook his head as he searched the racks. It didn't bear thinking about.

Arming himself with a few odds and ends he finally found something worth the rest put together – hidden under the counter was a vial of what looked like Felix Felicus.

_It must be a private stash, _Severus thought. _How bizarre. _

It was just a tiny vial… just enough.

He drank it and returned to the street. A muggle – a _marksman, _he realised – was standing in the alley with a wild, terrified look in his eyes, firing a huge, long fire-arm into the windows of the groaning Tavern. It's rapid _rat-tat-tat-tat-tat _cracked unendingly down the alleys. Comrades were rushing past him into the Tavern.

_Where the hell are these fucking muggles coming from? _He thought viciously, feeling something start to take effect in his body. _Dumbledore, if you've died in there I'll never forgive you_.

"_CONFRINGO!_" he bellowed, thrusting his wand at the firing Marksman, who promptly exploded.

He'd already decided that Potter was turning out to be far more trouble than he was worth.

* * *

Albus Dumbledore was quite effectively pinned down. He'd been using apparition to great effect until one of his accompanying Aurors – Dawlish, now dead – had noticed that a couple of the accompanying wizards to the Marksmen, not to mention the vampire, were also using apparition to their advantage.

He was battering away goblin magicks consistently and simply dodging goblin halberds, even though to his annoyance when the goblins saw him _in particular _they seemed to do everything in their power to kill him. His real opponent was still Saevus Malfoy, though, who was really very dangerous indeed.

The Twilight Tavern had been reduced essentially to a structure of scaffolding – most of the walls and windows had been blown out and, although the basic structure for the moment remained, it was a matter of minutes before the entire thing caved in.

There was _so much _debris that it was almost impossible to notice that they were all ankle-deep in the blood of more than one species.

He prayed, as he cast a barrage of stakes torn from the few remaining wall fittings in the vampire's general direction, that the call for Auror backup had got through…

"_Finxincere,_" he whispered towards a muggle who had successfully reloaded, removing all of the man's fingers.

_This is going from bad to worse, _he thought mildly, as his next flick animated a mostly-whole table.

The vampire was puzzling, at the back of his mind – he was using far more magic than most vampires were able, or comfortable, using. His speed, fangs and claws were getting exercised too, but the wand remained firmly in his cold grasp. Every attempt by Dumbledore thus far to disarm him had failed.

_And there's still no sign of Harry._

As if on cue, the boy himself exploded from the ceiling, tumbling down into the fray accompanied by floorboards, dust and whoever he'd been fighting, sending a dismembered wizard down ahead of him to clear the way.

He landed in a heap but quickly rose, and Dumbledore watched in his peripheral as Harry dodged and weaved his way through the ever-expanding crowd of Marksmen.

His heart broke a little more with every man that Harry cut or stabbed.

_They're calling in reinforcements constantly, somehow, _Dumbledore groaned internally. The muggles just never seemed to end. _It isn't even _legal _to perform magic on muggles, _he wondered incredulously. _Thank Merlin I'm fighting with aurors! The political ramifications of this…_

He realised that Harry wasn't casting any magic. At this moment he couldn't begin to speculate what that might mean, but it was a mental observation he made anyway. It didn't seem to matter – he wasn't distinguishing between targets, killing muggles and goblins alike – somehow – but it was unnerving to see how well he handled the dagger.

_The dagger..? I wonder how he got that back?_

With astounding force and on the heels of goblin reinforcements, Snape burst onto the battlefield casting spells left and right, hitting one of the lead goblins in the eye with a particularly enthusiastic Gouging Curse.

_So much for diplomatic integrity, _Dumbledore sighed, distracted, before something struck him in the face.

He staggered backwards, losing his footing and falling into a heap. The goblin responsible hadn't done it deliberately – he'd been swinging the halberd to strike Harry – but it opened the floodgates, for many eyes had been on Dumbledore. Suddenly, nobody in the room was picky any more about who was who – they knew who they were with and everyone else was fair game.

This took Saevus off of his hands for the minute, but Albus was suddenly surrounded by more than a dozen angry goblins trying to skewer him.

_Come along, Albus, _he admonished himself whilst rising. _Let's finish this nonsense. We've all had quite enough for one Christmas._

He began casting a series of strengthening runes into the wood at his knees, whilst deflecting goblin weaponry wandlessly; waiting for the moment to cast a large spell that would encompass the entire room…

* * *

Harry had quite effectively switched off.

It was basic, gut instinct his body was following as he fought, cutting and puncturing alternately, going through the motions effectively with tunnel vision.

Suddenly a _Duro! _Hex hit him in the right hand – instantly, it turned to stone. He glanced at Snape, who had lost his wand with the blow that had sent the curse off-course, then at his right hand.

_Ok, _he thought. _Hand-to-Hand it is._

He transferred his dagger to his left hand, awkwardly working out the metal from between the solid fingers, and swung, pushing it briskly into a man's side, as his right hand lifted and deflected a stray goblin sword in a shower of sparks.

_I'm losing momentum. Push, Shujin -_

With a huge heave he tried to press forward into the madness, striking left and right with his stone hand or dagger and, blissfully, dropping the goblins that his club-like hand came into contact with in single swings.

The dagger slipped out of his grasp – he'd managed, with tremendous force, to push it through a goblin's helmet and into the little beast's skull… but it didn't come out again.

He had the briefest lull in the briefest moment to decide: _It's time to leave._

He elbowed someone in the neck as they wrestled with a goblin, and then brought his stone hand down on the little beast's face, crushing it.

Then the _Duro_ Hex wore off – his hand was back to normal.

He surged, now essentially unarmed, through the chaos as a chair flew into him, almost knocking him from his feet, and a wizard marksman was lifted out of his way by the halberd that had impaled him, heaving the man up into the air like a trophy and fountaining blood down over Harry and the others as the world went red.

Harry shoulder barged someone out of the way, now intent only on escaping, and saw Saevus meet his eyes in fury. He was effectively imprisoned by Albus Dumbledore's hex, which continually conjured Stakes aimed at his chest that he had to bat away or dodge, one after the other.

Harry smiled his best Shujin-smile, the _Not today, motherfucker, _smile that had ended so few situations as of late, and staggered out of the suddenly clear hole in the side of the building. He turned his back to where he was walking, watching in case someone came through after him, and just about dodged a stray yellow curse.

Suddenly, there to his left, a crowd of Marksmen.

_Oh god._

He didn't think he had the energy left. He stared into their midst, astonished that he'd been cornered so easily, and seriously contemplated – for the first time in his life – just giving up.

_Giving up…_

But all at once they weren't looking at him – they were staring past him, uncertain, scared.

Harry's head spun slowly to see the Aurors lining up across the alley, twenty-something of them, wands outstretched.

Someone was speaking, voice amplified, and Harry held his breath, eyes closed, desperately trying to drag the smallest ounce of magic into his wasted, battered body.

_Almost…_

"Drop your weapons!" the Aurors were shouting at the Marksmen. "Move out of the way!" they were shouting at him.

_Almost…_

The Marksmen, not taking wizarding enforcement authorities seriously, were readying themselves for the fight. Barrels of handguns alternated between Harry and the Aurors.

_Almost…_

Harry opened his eyes, an electric crackle behind them, a faint smile on his face.

_I need enough for two…_

The situation was rapidly deteriorating. The fight from the Tavern was spilling into the alley, Dumbledore strode outside and locked eyes with him, then saw the line of Aurors, then the Marksmen, then yet another phalanx of goblins coming up behind the aurors with halberds outstretched.

Despite the shock Harry knew he was feeling, the Headmaster's facial expression was so fixed and stern that he looked like the bust of a Greek God… or at least like someone had hit him in the face with a _Duro! _Hex.

The briefest moment of silence came upon them. Everyone looked around them at who was there. Everyone knew how much trouble they were in. The Aurors began to look nervous.

Harry didn't care – he was ready. Without another word, he fell into his centre, ignited his Art with a hidden frustration, and disappeared into blackness.

* * *

Dumbledore sighed.

Had Harry been able to witness his own departure, he'd have heard the almighty crash as he burst the anti-apparition wards – a crash which made everyone jump, made twitchy fingers begin to pull triggers, made nervous Aurors release safety charms and offensive spells, make the Goblin phalanx break into a run, halberds lowered…

The Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was, quite rightly, recognised as one of the greatest living wizards. A staple he reinforced on this day, by raising his wand to the sky.

"_Immobilus Tempediment," _he whispered, and the effect was instantaneous: bullets slowed to a stop in mid-air, people froze in mid run, curses hovered, glowing, losing their velocity… everything stopped.

He broke the spell by allowing his wand arm to drop. As it did, spells, bullets and spears alike floated slowly to the ground. Goblins, wizards and muggles watched in awe and fear.

"That is quite enough," his voice rang out over the silence. "No more fighting. That's enough."

All eyes were on him. There was even silence in the Tavern behind him. Everything was still…

_Thank Merlin, _he thought. _That took about everything I had. What now?_

He didn't have to worry about what to do next, however – he suddenly felt a sharp pain in his back as Saevus Malfoy pressed himself against him, digging claws into his spine so that hot blood – the first he'd spilt today – dripped down his robes.

"Very good, old man," the vampire whispered softly into his hair, his voice carrying over the square. "Tell me where the boy went."

_Fawkes, _Dumbledore thought weakly, unable to move far lest his spine be damaged. He saw Aurors standing there dumbly, watching.

His Phoenix appeared on his shoulder. He heard a collective intake of breath, most noticeably from the creature behind him. _I'm safe, _Dumbledore thought hazily, his back beginning to throb. _I have done what I can._

In a flash of fire, feathers and phoenix song, all hell broke loose once more.

_

* * *

_

Hello there,

_Please don't get your hopes up – this fic is __**abandoned**__. However, I didn't want to post the notice confirming this without giving a tiny bit more of the story (as much as I'd written to that point) before doing so. It seemed a shame to let one of the better action scenes I've ever written go to waste._

_Back in the day when this was going strong, or fairly strong, I was posting a chapter every week or two. I was able to do this because the fic was already written and very nearly finished. Because I'm a n00b, when my hard-drive died (four chapters from the end) after 12/13 posted chapters, I couldn't post anymore because I'd not backed it up. I managed, with a hard drive recovery, to get bits and pieces of word documents back, but the entire storyline and all arcs, subplots and detailed notes were in .txt format. This format apparently doesn't recover well, as the encoding went to hell and I lost all of it._

_I started to write it again, reasoning that I'd written the 40-ish lost chapters already, and could do so again. You will, however, notice a massive decline in the quality of my storytelling at about this time because I was writing completely blind. This alone wouldn't have stopped me from continuing, but when I got to chapter 26, started this one and posted the prior, I read the story until that point. This stirred various memories of certain plots, characters and details that were integral to the story development that I'd completely forgotten to include. Nor could I remember how exactly I _had _included them._

_Needless to say, it fell apart. It's a shame and the fact that so many people have read and enjoyed the story and it's come to this is quite embarrassing. After 14 months of simply leaving it as is, I came across this last chapter in draft form, and thought I'd polish it up and give it a proper send-off._

_Now, I've been asked by members of a certain forum to let loose a couple of spoilers to give a sense of closure and let them know where it would have ended up going, had the shit not quite so vehemently hit the fan. Although I can't give details, having lost them, I'll post a couple that are relevant to where this was being taken;_

_**SPOILER ALERT **__(though for a dead story)_

_

* * *

_

Dumbledore began to exert more pressure on Harry's life, in an attempt to push him into a scenario where he had to ask the Headmaster for help. When he had a chance on Christmas Day, he had Fawkes kidnap Mar, guessing that the raven had a similar connection to Harry that Fawkes had to himself. Fawkes, all but imprisoning Mar, blocked any mental way of contacting Harry.

_When Mike was brought into the hospital wing after the battle at the restaurant, Dumbledore saw an opportunity to get an insight into what Harry was doing. He forced a type of consciousness on Mike and _leglimens'd_ his way into the man's mind. He saw about the bank heist and decided he'd do what he could to stop it. He also learnt a lot about Harry and the Marksmen, but those particular details couldn't have come into play with the direction it was going._

_Dumbledore impersonated Mike with the complicated variant of a Switching Spell. He left Mike, still dead to the world, looking like the Headmaster in the hospital wing, and took on his form and dialect. He staged the aftermath of a duel and break-out, and floo'd straight to the Leaky Cauldron (thereby alerting the aurors of an unauthorised Floo transport between two high-profile locations) and into the meeting between Harry and Taye. The entire time of Taye impersonating Lucius, Dumbledore was impersonating Mike, with full access to a selection of Chow's past behaviour and memories._

_Such was his deception that only Fawkes realised that Dumbledore wasn't comatose. However, since Dumbledore had blocked their connection to avoid distraction, Fawkes left the Head's office – and Mar – to search for him. When the heist went wrong, Fawkes flamed into the bank and grabbed the trunk that he thought contained the Headmaster – it was the wrong trunk. Dumbledore, as Mike, was in the other one and had performed his very advanced compression charm to avoid detection. From Harry's was coming a very strong 'SOS' signal as he tried to disapparate, so Fawkes took that one. At this point, several things happened; the goblins activated their emergency wards, Harry's trunk did exactly the same thing as it felt a foreign influence take hold of it, and Fawkes' magic overwhelmed both and flamed to the next best thing from Dumbledore… the Deputy Head. Who was at that exact moment preoccupied with being tortured by Marksmen. The magical backlash from three very powerful sources of magic at loggerheads caused an explosion – the trunk spewed the stolen galleons across the Square, the vault wards killed the goblins in there along with what was left of Taye, McGonagall was flung – shielded slightly by her tormentor's body – into the Square, and the phoenix was forced into an early burning day. Harry's magic itself simply switched off with the effort of surviving the blast, and would take a long time from that moment to properly heal itself. Bye bye, super-powered Harry._

_After all of this, Dumbledore extracted himself from the trunk and what remained of the vault, and simply walked out as himself through the bank, deigning to refresh his disguise outside and walk back in, allowing himself to be caught and taken back to the Hogwarts Infirmary. Unfortunately, despite his notice-me-nots (which only effect the fully-conscious), an injured goblin on the floor of the bank atrium saw him, and when fully awakened warned everyone else present that the Headmaster had just walked out of the bank. Lucius and a company of very angry goblins made their way out just as 'Mike' walked into the bank behind them, turning himself in to the aurors there. An _obliviate_ or two later and Dawlish was marching him off to the Floo, wherein at Hogwarts he simply overpowered the aurors, switched the bodies back, put the still-unconscious Chow on the floor and quietly memory-charmed everyone present… including Snape._

_Quite determined to go after Harry now he'd witnessed the boy commit a serious crime – technically a warcrime, also, as the goblins would undoubtedly go to war if heads didn't literally roll for the murder of their own kind – he took a few of those aurors to where he knew Harry would have retreated to… the Twilight Tavern. Hence this chapter, which was the end of Book Two._

_After this chapter, however, things get a little messier. In summary, the goblins are a hair's breadth from declaring war, shutting the bank and imploding the economy. Bite-Helm has given copies of the letter Harry wrote to him to both Lucius Malfoy and Dumbledore, and is attempting – with Malfoy's help – to get Harry declared a fugitive. Harry himself is nowhere to be found. The Marksmen are also on the warpath, but their numbers are by this point so depleted that they're using their few wizarding allies to carry out Acts of Terror against the general magical populace – Diagon Alley is hit more than once, and a shipment of dungbombs to Zonko's in Hogsmeade turns out to be a shipment of live grenades, levelling half the street. Wizarding Britain begins to fear these unknown people and their calling card – a blood-red ring – as the terrorism gets more incessant. _

_Dumbledore is trying to hold it all together – the Wizengamot are furiously aware that it's muggles who comprise the Marksmen, though it turns out that there are far more magical men and women involved in it than anyone would have thought possible – apparently, after the fall of Voldemort, plenty of those who'd been on his payroll needed something to fill that gap and, despite their prejudices, recognised that money is money no matter who is paying it. The source of this information? Dumbledore… who has knowingly let the muggleborn wizard son of a 'reformed' Marksman attend his school (__**Ali Sumesqi**__, who is at Hogwarts at the bequest of the Humes, who have decided that fully-trained wizards loyal _only _to them is a good idea. They've set Ali recruiting, also)._

_Saevus has managed to find Harry, after an epic hunt across the Alps. Unfortunately, Harry is caught, and Turned. Yes – Harry was going to become a vampire in Book Three of Unforgiven. Book Three was predominantly going to be about Saevus' attempts to control his new slave, and Harry's mostly-successful resistance (this doesn't mean slash – Saevus will stoop to fucking his sister-in-law, but not to paedophilia). Harry was going to be entirely ignorant about the turmoil taking place in Britain for the majority of Book Three, and instead find out from the much-hated Saevus all about the Marksmen – who they are, what they're doing, who __**Mito Nobunaga **__was (a badass Japanese warlock from the old school, in hiding after working for several years with the Hume family), the fact that __**Mike Chow **__sold Harry out more than once to save his girlfriend's life, and so on._

_Meanwhile in this part, Snape starts catching on to Quirrel, guessing that something's not quite right about the man. As Dumbledore is so precoccupied and McGonagall is still in St. Mungo's, Quirrel begins to have almost a free reign at the school, but very quietly. He no longer has to hide his expeditions around the castle and becomes less stammery. _

_End of Book Three was going to include Dumbledore finally negotiating peace with the goblins… in return for a lifetime of excruciating torture for Mike Chow. Dumbledore accepts, certain that the only way to draw Harry out is to let him have a chance of perhaps saving his friend. Meanwhile, Quirrel makes a go for the Philosopher's Stone and Snape goes after him. In front of the Mirror of Erised, Quirrel was going to reveal Voldemort to Snape, who in turn was going to make him swear allegiance. A Snape-Quirrel-Voldemort alliance would there have begun, to some extent (Snape would have stayed loyal to Dumbledore, mainly) but they wouldn't have been able to get at the Stone. They would have destroyed the Mirror, and with it its contents, and gone back undercover in the school. Meanwhile, Harry escapes Saevus to go and find Mike Chow, who he's been told holds the key to defeating the Marksmen once and for all. He is also going to exact revenge._

_Book Four was the final one and so obviously the resolution to everything. A few major battles and whatnot. Harry decides against saving Mike when he learns of his fate and instead takes the terror-tactics fight back to the Marksmen. Harry kills Draco and frames Sumesqi for it, which takes place _inside _Hogwarts. Voldemort Returns to some extent, though not publicly, and Dumbledore has to devote a lot of his time to that. Harry could care less about any of this – he's decided the Marksmen are his priority. _

_It's mostly a haze from here – Narcissa manages to kill Saevus. Harry wipes out most of the Marksmen, with exceptionally fortuitous timing (they are about to ally with Voldemort through Quirrel, Snape and Malfoy Snr.) and has a little unlikely help in the form of a fires-of-hell vengeful McGonagall, who takes out a good portion of the Marksmen building single-handedly. When it is discovered that _Harry _did it, though, he is hailed as an even greater hero by the wizarding populace, who couldn't care a whim for details and simply see the 'Boy-Who-Lived Vanquishes Marksmen' headlines. Mike dies, anticlimactically, in goblin captivity. Everything's hunky dory once again._

_Apart from Unforgiven ending with the discovery at Hogwarts of a petrified-to-death Ron Weasley and a message in blood on the wall._

_**

* * *

**_

END OF SPOILERS

_So these are just a few of the places I wanted to take this story. Obviously there's loads more but this is off the top of my head. It's a massive shame it couldn't come to fulfil its potential but as you can likely tell, so much of the groundwork for a lot of this was lost in translation. Ah well._

_I hope you enjoyed where it got to all the same. Cheers for sticking with it. Once again, a thousand apologies if you were getting into this at any point. I'm working on a new story after a long time spent away from fanfiction and I'll probably stick with the Grinning Lizard username. Said new story will be triple backed up. _

_Until then;_

_Peace,_

_G.L._


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